Prof Bueltmann, who’s made her life in Scotland for 20 years, was (as far as we can tell) the only independence supporter to speak at a poorly-attended rally in Edinburgh calling for a fatuously-named “People’s Vote” on Brexit.

And when some Twitter users expressed a modicum of resentment at being ordered to get behind the “People’s Vote” campaign by the very people who are responsible for Scotland still being shackled to the UK and therefore dragged out of the EU in the first place, the Unionists got terribly hurt and sniffy.

But the stushie did serve to illustrate the hideously uncomfortable relationship that now exists between the traditional UK liberal left and supporters of Scottish independence, who under any rational conditions might have expected to have had the support of the left in the same way it unquestioningly supports independence for every country on the face of the Earth that isn’t Scotland.

(The other exception is Catalonia, about whose brutal and literally fascist oppression by the Spanish government Labour is still doggedly and disgracefully silent.)

Because let’s face this fact head-on: a second EU referendum and a second indyref do not exist in isolation from each other. Each one damages the interests of the other. An independent Scotland would reduce the rUK’s chances of reversing Brexit, and reversing Brexit would damage the arguments for an independent Scotland.

So those of us who want both independence and to remain in the EU are faced with a situation where we have to prioritise either the fight for independence – which achieves BOTH things – or putting our energies towards a second EUref, which might achieve one but only at the cost of actively harming the other.

What the liberal left is demanding, then, is that Yes supporters and the SNP should meekly drop the thing they’ve campaigned for all their lives in order to help the liberal left, who will then turn round and say “Shut up and eat your cereal you Nazis, you voted No, now is not the time“ when the Yes movement wants their backing in return.

And yet despite this treatment, Yes supporters ARE – perhaps foolishly – still willing to offer their assistance. Our recent poll found that it wasn’t Yes supporters who were the problem. By marginally over two to one they back a second EU vote, while No voters are opposed to one by a significant margin.

But as far as we’re aware, nobody on the Edinburgh platform yesterday opened their demands for support by apologising to Scots for having told them to vote No to stay in the EU, and therefore causing them to be dragged out of it. And nobody (that we’ve seen) has apologised for it afterwards either. A little humility might have been in order.

Because we all know that if Brexit is somehow averted, the UK will return to business as usual. Scotland – which has been entirely excluded from Brexit negotiations – will be told to get back into its box again. The UK will continue to get whatever England wants, and if the wee diddy nations don’t like it, well, they can just get stuffed.

There will be no quid pro quo. Having helped the UK stay in the EU – which doesn’t impose governments on one member state because they were voted for by another, and which allows member states to leave any time they like – Scotland will be ordered to remain as the ignored junior partner in a union which DOES impose unelected governments and DOESN’T grant Scotland the freedom to leave if it wants.

(Bremner and some others, we should note, have said that they personally wouldn’t object to another indyref, but since none of them have any power to actually deliver it that doesn’t count for a whole lot.)

“People’s Vote” Unionists are allowed to be hypocrites if they want. It’s a free-ish country. But to then whine like a bunch of hurt babies when a few folk tell them to ram their one-sided demands up their hoop is really pushing their luck.

You’d probably have to test this by polling to prove it but I’d be shocked if a substantial number of Yessers who say they want a second EU vote aren’t just petrified that we won’t take the chance to have an indyref quickly enough to avoid being left at the mercy of whatever the Tories have got planned for us all after Brexit.

So, it’s a ‘whatever avenue to avoid that, please!’ scenario, although I personally don’t see an second EURef as a solution to this at all – it’s effectively an issue with Scots (especially Yessers but Remainers too, if only they understood the effect of what saying ‘we can’t trust those who rule us to do a Brexit that works for us all REALLY means about what they think about UK rule!) having no trust in rule from London, and there’s only one way we can really say ‘we’re not having any more of that!’.

“You’d probably have to test this by polling to prove it but I’d be shocked if a substantial number of Yessers who say they want a second EU vote aren’t just petrified that we won’t take the chance to have an indyref quickly enough to avoid being left at the mercy of whatever the Tories have got planned for us all after Brexit.”

Scotland has passed judgement on Brexit – we emphatically reject it. So why would we want to say the same all over again just to be ignored all over again should England vote to leave, again?

It’s England that needs to make its mind up about what it wants.

Scotland (and NI) need to make our own minds up about where we go. The ‘union’ which we need to consider is not the European one!

The hallmark of British Nationalism, in all its forms, is hypocrisy. So the pro EU faction want another referendum on a very weak argument, yet Scotland mustn’t have another referendum when everything has completely and utterly changed! BritNats don’t do irony or self awareness!

Those on their soapbox in Edinburgh yesterday clearly expected Scotland to just say, ‘oh aye, fine, let’s get behind you who shafted our country in 2014, because we should love the UK’.
Bizarre.

I posted this on the previous article, but relevant here. I saw the ‘peoplesvotescotland’ twitter claims of ‘abuse’ last night.

Looks like the ‘peoplesvotescotland’ so called, remainers on their soap box in Edinburgh yesterday, were there to distract from the huge Dundee independence march, I knew it would feature in the news.

‘We love the EU because we love the UK’. Scotland get behind us, or you are being very selfish and abusive for not, on twitter.

Scotland owes England nothing. Scotland has been treated appallingly for far too long, tolerated it, and is now expected to stand with those who lied about the EU during our referendum in 2014. I do not think so!

English celebs, you have millions of people you could be shouting at from a soap box, why on earth come to Scotland to tell us we should ‘love the UK’!

Having lived in Scotland for 300+ years, the ‘UK’ has clearly not ‘loved’ Scotland, but kept her poor and begging. That’s abuse, not love.

Scottish people have been incredibly patient, and forgiving, now they see how this ‘love the UK’ has conditions attached to it, ie we keep taking your oil, your revenues, house our wmd’s on your doorstep, etc, and you will continue to shut up and put up. Elected majority of SNP MP’s? Ha ha Scotland, we vote and you get what we want, lolz!

Scotland has to be a bit selfish now, it’s a matter of survival, it’s that bloody simple!

When they say People’s Vote they mean English voters only because they argue the English have changed their minds about Brexit and so PeeVees are now demanding a second referendum as a consequence. Scots also realise our votes and voices don’t count in the UK as promised in the 2014 independence referendum and hoped they would be in the 2016 EU referendum.

My advice tell the PeeVees like Bremmner, Esler and Campbell to get stuffed. IndyRef2 or bust, even if that means a No Deal Brexit.

Why on earth would anyone want to participate in this ridiculous, in my view, People’s vote?

Who voted in 2016 … Badgers … squirrels … dugs … cats?

Feartie has already said numerous times (yes I remember too that she said she would not hold a G.E. 😀 ) that she will not hold another People’s vote so this calling for one is nothing more than a pile of old shite!

Anyway Westminster does NOT listen to Scotland. WE are ignored by WM. WE are also ignored by and large by the people of England as well!

The people calling on us to support their call for a People’s vote are the self same people, by and large, who LIED to us in 2014. Sorry Bubba, YOU lied to me in 2014 … until such times as YOU apologise for LYING to me and make serious amends for this I will NEVER support you and your People’s vote shite!

If just one of these people coming up to tell us how to vote and, more importantly, why we should vote a certain way could step back and look at themselves.

Just think of the effect a bit of humility, an admission they got it wrong in 2014 when the consequences of a NO vote were clear to so many. Just think how they could engage instead of telling us off for not being compliant and grateful for them wafting across the border now and then.

If just one of them said they had been wrong or that they would support another Independence vote no matter what, please support a People’s Vote for the EURef, then they might get a better reception.

Tanja Bueltmann has supported Scottish Independence in the past, was it just because it suited her pro-EU agenda? I cannot understand why she would be so shocked at the Better Together message being so vehemently rejected if she had any understanding of Scottish Politics.

I posted this on another thread. Just seen Tanja B is still extremely defensive and unaware of how much offence her promotion of the BT message has caused. Is she saying her support for Scottish Independence is now equivocal because she has been challenged and that others feel the same? Way to go Tanja, how to lose friends goes both ways!

Oh deary me, Malcolm McLeod has alot of words to eat. I was not at all impressed by one article in particular that he wrote.

Has anyone asked this man, who’s heart I have reason to believe is in the right place, if given the events since 2014, has had reason to chance his position on Scottish Independence given what is happening to the NHS in England and will soon be visited on the Scottish Health Service?

Malcolm McLeod is a qualified doctor. That takes quite a bit of studying and some kahunnas. I would like to think he has the strength, intelligence and self awareness to reconsider his position now.

Hi Stu, what I meant was that some Yessers are probably in favour of a second EURef vote simply as it is another avenue by which to avoid being left at the mercy of the Tories (and that it is ‘insurance’ in case we don’t go for an indyref quickly enough to avoid that).

For others, of course, it will simply be a matter of principle/ But it might be interesting to know how many would want a 2nd EURef in the (as yet admittedly hypothetical) situation where indyref 2 was already happening.

Just beyond comprehension. Scotland voted to stay in the EU. Despite the cheating and lying by Westminster unionists and the Leave campaign.

Scotland needs another IndyRef because of the cheating and lying by Westminster unionists, especially about EU membership. These EU supporters do not support EU support for self governance and self determination in Scotland. Cameron’s EVEL demands the next day. Appalling hypocrisy.

The LibDem/Condems facilitated the Tory EU Referendum. Total hypocrites.

Having a look around twitter regarding these people’s vote tweets. It’s amazing how quickly when you disagree with them it turns from the pre 2014 love-in to the ‘you just hate the English’ when you are not persuaded by their weak arguments.

I have already voted to stay in the EU, I don’t want another vote. I also expect the Scottish Government to take heed of this vote in Scotland and make sure the sovereign wishes of the people of Scotland are honoured. After all what is the point of being sovereign, having it ratified at Westminster, then still having the wishes of the majority ignored.

And for those that claim their Remain vote wasn’t a endorsement for independence, well they have no such qualms using peoples No vote to take us out of the EU despite remaining was one of the No promises.

Lolz re my comment, I am getting on a bit but haven’t lived in Scotland for anywhere near 300 years! It’s more like 30, oh dear! Still the ‘union’ has been for over 300 years,and it’s time for England to let go.

Rory Bremner ?, heard him denouncing the idea of Scottish independence, he came across as a very,very committed unionist, (well most of his work is tied up in England) .
I was disgusted at the way he belittled Scotland, when the time comes for our referendum on independence, mark my words, he will be very,very vocal in his condemnation of the very idea.
So, unlike last time we MUST immediately counter such outbursts, from the likes of him, and Broon, (aye they’ll drag him back out of the woodwork) and do it in all the media outlets available in this day and age.

It’s really simple folks – do you want independence or not? Everything else is a distraction by those who want you to lose sight of that because it doesn’t suit their agenda. For everyone’s sake, don’t let this ridiculous smoke screen be The Vow2.

Every step of the way England has buggered this up, they never listened to Scotland when we said *we’d like to remain thank you very much* they said we were unpatriotic, now if we don’t do as we’re told again we’ll be unpatriotic again

It seems that no matter what Scotland says or does at any given moment it’s the wrong thing at that same given moment and England doesn’t listen anyway except for when they say *we’re listening but only if you agree with us*

Scotland, you may take no part in our decisions says the Big England but we insist on your subservience which we’ll call agreement but we will not hold it against you (normally) and if you do as we tell you then we won’t do anything bad to you (normally)

Folks of Scotland, England is a failed state because the poor sods down there only have one political party (who pretend to be two parties) to vote for so they’re stuck between a Tory lot who are arguing with each other as to how to get their arses out of a bad situation without looking like arses and a Labour lot who are fake arguing with themselves for as much bad publicity as they can get because they don’t want the job of being the government who gets the blame for the massive con perpetrated on the people of the big England and then to go down in history as the party who delivered the most poverty since the black death

There are people in Scotland who will vote for anything these two idiot parties promote because they’re the Unionist party and they will tell their supporters they’ll make sure that only nasty Scottish nationalists will die of the black death but the Union will endure, but it won’t, the black death like the flu generally only affects us, I’ll put money on it now Jacob Reese Mogg and chums won’t be afflicted by any of these maladies

P.S. As for “Ming” the has- been ought to stay where he belongs, on the waste “bing” !,
I’ll screen if I hear him mention federalism again, it was a dead issue way back in the 1910 era, as a result the corpse today stinks to high heaven.

Scotland is a region, a word, and to the British, not a nation, the point they miss is ‘a union based on threats is not a union’. Their inability to genuinely change the political system, it’s inequality and farcical media, is bringing about the death of their ‘union’.
The people of England are the only ones who can change this, but because the LabServativeDems are a major factor of the British establishment, then the people of England have no choices.

If I was from, say, Yorkshire, or Cornwall or Devon, I would want a regional parliament to bring about better governance, the German model is very successful. Scotland’s social and political culture is vastly different and if Scotland is left in the UK without the EU, then many people here fear the historical abuse that the British establishment will carry out in order to destroy Scotland and it’s annoying differences.
The unionist movement in Scotland is largely made up of Tory Toffs or mindless thugs, we know who will get who to do what after Scotland is pulled out of the EU.

To those in Scotland who voted ‘No’ in 2014 then voted ‘Remain’ in 2016 and who now feel aggrieved at the prospect of Brexit; Rory, etc…

In 2014, you voted to hand the electorate in England the power to determine your country’s future.

In doing so, you forever forfeited the right to complain in the event that the electorate in England voted in a way which directly contradicted your own wishes and/or the wishes of the majority of the electorate in Scotland.

Now we see with Rory, etc. not so much a case of wanting to have your cake AND eat it, but more a case of having given your entire cake to your neighbour, then watched as your neighbour fed it to the birds, you decide now the cake has gone that you didn’t want your neighbour to feed it to the birds and would rather you and your family had been able to enjoy it.

YOU HAVE NO RIGHT to complain about what your neighbour did with the cake and you certainly have no right to complain about those who said to you at the time that giving your cake away was a bad idea.

So, having given ALL our cakes away, Rory and his Better Together chums will have to join the rest of us down at the Great British Bakery for a big helping of Unionist Brexitcake, because without a slice of Indyref2 that’s all there is and all there ever will be!

1. Come polling day the choice in both was confusingly about two change options. A good clear referendum should be change versus status quo. Neither offered that.

2. The winning options were very badly defined in both.

However there was one massive difference! The winning side in both made woolly undefined promises, yes.

However in IndyRef the BetterTogether enhanced devolution promises could have been delivered, they weren’t outlandish nor unrealistic. They were believable. They were achievable. (Though, those of us sceptical about WM never expected their delivery!)

In EURef, many of the promises and visions sold were never achievable. And that should have been obvious to anyone who cared to look around. It wasn’t a matter of trust, it was a matter of stupidity!

So why does that matter? The Scottish situation is about the system failing to deliver on devolution, but could have. The Brexit situation is about the system trying to deliver something which is at best a shit show and at worst simply undeliverable. The two are intertwined and puts the arguments for Indy on a much stronger footing.

They really are following the abusive marriage theme, aren’t they? We look like we might leave and they lovebomb us with all the “better together” bollox. So, like millions of abused spouses before us, we say, OK, we’ll give it another go, it’s been a long time after all.

And immediately we give up the power, it’s all EVEL and Brexit and STFU, Scotland. It takes a wee while, but we start again to gather our resources to leave and we’re told we made the decision to stay already, we’re selfish and don’t love them enough to support them – classic DARVO!*

The next part of the script is where we tell them we’re leaving anyway. That’s when they get really dangerous.

Farage is back to split the Tory vote so Labour will win and get the blame for everything.
So do I think there will be a GE soon. YES
If there is, the SNP should say as this is a advisory vote for independence.

REV Posts almost always good – but this one FUCKING NAILS IT – it cuts like a HIGH POWER LASER

I have hated the Guardian for a long time = The Daily Telegraph + virtue signalling (“girlpower” and a “be nice to poofs” stickers)

Steve Bell who seemed to stand alone against Thatcherism in those dark times, he is also a cunt. “nationalist” and “socialist” … equals … a fucking cheap shot for a “top level satirical cartoonist”

Georgie Galloway – don’t get me started – “A HOMELAND FOR THE PALESTINIANS” (fair enough!) … but not for the Scots. Too wee, too poor, the currency, the oil will run out … the working class of Glasgow have more in common with the working claass of Liverpool … all the usual shitey waffle peddled out (- you should have seen him on Max Keiser in 2014, Max was baffled)

Ostensibly the Guardian should support the SNP and independence, in terms of its policies … instead you get the phlegm spittle and crazy eyes of Michael White, he of the intimidating moustache – and we all know the reason – the Empire and all its scams and crimes, the runoff, the “trickle down” means that all these London arseholes, especially journalists – all have a nice slot in the corporation, even if they pretend to be against it.

The English RIGHT stab you in the front, at least – the English LEFT, stab you in the back. Either way, you BLEED.

Just to be clear any “independence supporter” who tries to big-up Corbyn – you need to slap them down, immediately.

The sick irony is, for all their passion, none of these LUVVIES have any “skin in the game” – their money will be stashed safely in “tax efficient vehicles” and they have second homes in the Dordogne and Tuscany – the “shit hitting the fan”-aspects of Brexit will not touch them.

So let’s say England votes by a much smaller margin to LEAVE but a bigger REMAIN vote in Scotland is just enough to swing the overall vote to keep England IN the EU–what would we be told then.

Aye–you guessed it. That situation would not be regarded as a UK-wide vote – it would be regarded as the ‘tail wagging the dog’.

And that is exactly how such a second result would be spun by the BritNat media. WM would ensure that England always gets its full English Brexit regardless of how Scotland votes. That’s the simple truth and it will only ever change when we take our future and our lives into our own hands. Our vote counts only when it is in agreement with that in England.

Have as many referendums as you like I say. Surely we have argued this before – Referendums (referenda?) On anything you like as often as you like no?
The particular democratic deficit for Scotland though we know all about. Another EU ref, if called,will be pointless in Scotland. Another snap G.E if SNP don’t stand on an Indy ticket, will be pointless in Scotland. Well for Indy supporters anyway.

I’m also uncomfortable with “We said No and we meant it” type discourse I see creeping in from Indy supporters.
“No to another referendum” and “We voted No and we meant it” Sound familiar?

Anyway, yes it’s a complication we need like a hole in the head, yes the celebs and southern politicos are ignorant arses, yes Scotland is just here to be manipulated, so what’s new? Been, seen, t-shirt. – Let’s just get on with Independence. There are three pish easy bites of the cherry coming down the line in the near future. Put a cross in the box.

The irony…The People’s Vote Liberation Army coming up to Jockistan to plead with us to support another EU ‘people’s vote’ Referendum…..cause we, the Scots, we only voted 62% to remain in first EU Referendum vote so like we need some persuasion to want to remain in the EU…doh!

Second Indy ref you say….why ?…you’ll have had your vote…fair and square…facts accurate and promises met….all above board in 2014…nothing to see there….look to the future not to the past Jocks….however see that EU ref….. well in the 2016 EU Ref (the past) lies were told, risks not explained, false promises made and it effects the country we love…what country ?…clue NOT Scotland..

So Jocks get the SNP to commit to being fully on board with SECOND EU PEOPLE’S VOTE …yes we know they have always wanted to stay in EU but THEY are now the problem ….cause they are not playing ball….why are they not complying with our wishes…see Jocks you are so awkward….generating division with this Indy obsession….it was a UK vote Jocks and so will the people’s vote be a UK vote….if the SNP will just stop dragging their feet on this….see we knew you would be awkward…this is all your fault…see if we do not get a people’s vote then Brexit will be the SNP and the Jocks fault.

Am raging again….wtaf is Rory Bremner spewing out…oh fellow Jocks get with the programme help England to sort out the mess England has created and that you didn’t ……you better stay in the UKOK or you will be the enemy and I endorse this message……that my new adopted country will no longer trade with you…..blackmail ? …..project fear ?….no …JUST A true FACT, true RISK , TRUE WARNING AND A PROMISE IN FACT A VOW !……Oh fellow Jocks save the UKOK …..perhaps you could swing the vote for us…..what ? I am ignoring all the broken promises , lies told via non factual information , misleading and false risks given and fake warnings in 2014…..oh and the strong suggestion presented as a FACT in material endorsed by BT that voting No ensures staying in EU……sorry not relevant now….this is more important…this is ENGLAND we are talking about here fellow thick Jocks….stop spoiling it ….as Ruth says “say No to second Independence Referendum” and actually agree with Theresa ‘Now is not the time’…in fact it will never be the time to have a SECOND Indy ref…..get over it…you LOST…Now about this SECOND EU Ref that we want you to support cause we LOST the first one………….

As for Menzies Campbell….oh Leave side told lies…THIS from a man whose colleague on radio stated “ALL politicians lie’…and whose other colleague Carmichael FibDem blatantly lied on national TV….kettle calling pot fecken black !!! And whose party ENDORSED and participated in a campaign of FEAR , FALSE PROMISES and LIES in 2014 to con fellow Scots to remain a ‘part/region’ of UKOK.

And so another sorry UKOK chapter begins where if that region/part ( not country) of UKOK called Jockistan refuses to dance to the BT tune then …what ?………well ……..here’s a thought, naive I know but they might just try persuading more and concentrating their efforts more into the parts of the UKOK that voted to actually fecken LEAVE the EU in first EU Referendum to get THEM to reconsider and agree to a people’s vote oh and this time siding with Jocks and voting to REMAIN in EU ….hmm….just an idea like…..what’s the point of hassling a ‘part/region’ that wants to stay and voted to stay in EU and a political party who currently are government in that ‘part/region’ who also wants to stay and campaigns to stay in EU ….how about concentrating on those ‘parts/regions’ who are still determined to leave …..just a thought….oh and eh the ‘part’ or ‘region’ as you BT mob like to call it ,and as specified by WM’s poodle Fluffy ‘…..they might not need to be involved in your people’s vote cause they have another way to stay….yep….voting for independence and thus REMAINING in the EU…….time you considered that …cause we in Scotland have a people’s vote also…..just not the one you are punting !!!!!!!!!!!!

I don’t know what is worse, being lectured and condescended to by Establishment shills like Bremner and Esler who happily pooped all over our doorstep in 2014 or being exposed to the sheer, breath-taking hypocrisy of the infantile Left.

“In the early years of last century we see the Liberal Party, at that point the alternative party of power to the Tories, tear itself apart on the Irish Question and open the door to being replaced by the young Labour Party. Some of the Liberals supported an Irish Parliament and even Irish home rule and some of it joined with the Tories against it.

We move forward today and see history repeating itself today in the behaviour of the Labour Party in Scotland as it destroys itself . As the Tory government in London inflicts austerity on the UK, attacks benefits to the needy and the disabled, mismanages the NHS in England and starts a privitisation process of it (which has very significant consequence for the NHS in Scotland) the Labour Party in Scotland, formed to defend the people against the Tories, joins with the same Tories in running Scottish councils. It spends most of its time in Parliament and through its influence in the media ignoring the enemy its supporters expect it to oppose while attacking the SNP. It has become a tool of the UK establishment and completely lost the plot. It is hardly surprising that huge elements of traditional Labour support has moved to the SNP and the process is accelerating.

If the likes of Keir Hardie, James Connolly, John McLean and James Maxton and all those other pioneers who provided the fire for a radical vision of a better self governing Scotland were leading Labour in Scotland today I know exactly what they would be doing.

Hypocrisy knows no bounds. Just watched Gordon Brown being trotted out again – this time to say nice things about Kofi Annan.
This is the Kofi Annan that declared the invasion of Iraq illegal and an abomination – the invasion of Iraq voted for by Gordon Brown and most of the Labour Party which was in government at the time.
Lest we forget

Yesterday wasn’t about the people, not in Scotland. You’d have to be a gold standard idiot not to realise that Scotland voted comprehensively to remain. It was about getting Scotland’s people to pressurize Scotland’s party of government to get behind yet another UK vote, where ultimately we’ll be ignored in the aftermath.

Oh, and if England and Wales choose a pro Brexit stance again? What then? Do we warrant an apology after that?

As I’ve said before. It seems to me that one ballot, one YES vote and two problems get solved.

They can take their idea and stick it where the sun doesn’t shine. I do not trust any one of them and at no time in my 70+ years have i wanted to contribute anything to their UK.

How dare they? They dare because they have zero self-awareness.

I am seriously struggling to avoid writing an endless stream of abuse.

I hope there is no-one who genuinely supports Scotland’s return to independence who has the slightest doubt that Corbyn is toxic. He is an utter, disingenuous hypocrite who, if he had been Russian, would have worked tirelessly to avoid the break up of the Soviet Union. He represents the fascist left. It is no wonder that on Brexit and on Scottish independence he finds himself in the same team as the extreme right of the Tory party. Two cheeks of the same British imperialist arse.

I honestly believe that the relationship between Scotland and England is like that of the butler Hudson to the Bellamy family in Upstairs Downstairs.
He knew all their business,looked after their every need, and was fondly regarded as a trusted and loyal servant.

However ,the relationship only ever had one power in control.
A servant is still, and always will be ,a servant.

it gets us back into ‘behave’ mode, do what your telt, we are the bosses.

It wastes time and energy which could be spent on IndyRef2.

If it won, it neutralises our democratic right to hold another IndyRef.

Since Scotland really is the UK’s Cash Cow, my only surprise is at them taking so long to start playing this card. I seriously doubt the timing is an accident.

The Shit part of Brexshit is really coming to the fore now, and likely to be playing big now, all the way… and since there is no good Brexshit, even if they try to damp it down, they don’t have much to combat it with.

Other than Racism… and here’s Farage, come to sing that tune to his favourite audience.

The mad Brexteers, need a no deal Brexit, because all other permutations of membership/deal involve utilising the European Court of Justice… which means the Off Shore Tax Havens will get booked by the EU.

The sane (I use the term loosely) Brexiteers, in Government anyway, never actually had a plan, still don’t have a plan, and still don’t know what it is they want to achieve (other than to cling to power). So Norway, Canada, Canada plus, EFTA, etc there were good bits and bad bits to all of these, but if you don’t know what you want, how can you negotiate to achieve it – impossible.

The EU, come what may, will very likely offer some form of extension. Purely out of self interest, so that they can increase their customs, port infrastructure, etc. But with no serious efforts on the part of the Brits to actually negotiate some form of deal, it will be a minimum extension with no hope of the allowing Article 50 to be cancelled in the long run.

So we have very little hope of a sensible Brexit
We are heading towards a No deal ‘disaster’ Brexit
We have a rabble rousing racist, about to get full TV and media coverage, as he campaigns all over the UK
We have, hippocritical Brit Nat lefties, trying to bring the porridge -ogs to heal (with EURef2 pressure) and if they fail to do so, creating a new group to blame
the UK has very little time to arrange a new EURef2, even if persuaded to do so
We have the weakest PM in living memory, and an opposition leader who may actually be being rather clever and not playing ball by opposing her and Brexit, so that the Labour party can carry the can when the shit hits the fan. Or he may just be a mad Brexiteer too, and totally inept. Either way, without his support a new EURef2 looks unlikely or much more difficult for them to achieve.

And we have the power grab underway
Come 29/3/19 we lose the backing of the EU court should WM start breaking laws
Come 29/3/19 we will undoubtedly lose many of our European friends who have made their homes here. While that vote will be neutral, their presence bears witness internationally.
And we have 5000 unelected and unaccountable, civil servants moving into Edinburgh to take over from Holyrood.

If a hard Brexit results in food shortages, chaos, riots – army personnel in place to deal with same (all of which is now regularly commented upon in the media) I think its likely Scotland will find itself an occupied territory in all but name. And in times of heightened security, information exchanges are the first thing to be clamped down on. Bye-bye wings.

Of course there could be another snap GE or change in Torie leader – which doesn’t really change any of the above. Although it would provide the new PM with an opportunity to ‘look strong’ by deploying the army – Boris cleaning the streets, doing a Victory sign and smoking a cigar anyone?

I wonder what would be the effect if the First Minister was to make it known that in any forthcoming GE the SNP reserves the right to stand on a Manifesto of winning a majority of MP seats = Indy.

I wonder what the effects would be if the First Minister was to knock back all the EURef2 pressure with a gentle suggestion that England and Wales should have another EURef if they want to
(can’t see why this would not be do-able, since they are one entity (sorry Wales, not trying to do you down, just conscious that legally England is recognised as a Nation and Wales its Principality)
but that Scotland had already made its voice known and the current opinion polls support this view.

Anyhow, that’s how I see things at the moment. I honestly thought the pressure for EURef2 would have come a long time ago from the powers that be. More and more I think it is just the other side of the skelpit arse doing its thing, and its all part of the one game plan. Create chaos, send in the army, take Scotland (quietly) by force.

Nails it. The only reason for them to be spouting this message now is to pressure the ScotGov to put their pet project before indyref2.

Scots have basically signified their will vis-a-vis in 2014 and have also made it more or less plain that if there was a 2nd EURef, they’d support it. So there was no need for that thing yesterday except to try and pressure the FM into not saying anything over the autumn because they want Scot Remain voters to think a 2nd EURef should be put ahead of an indyref.

The involvement of so many leading No’ers from 2014 just makes that even more transparent, as do the witterings of Iain MacWhirter (‘indyref hopes fade….’, says feckin who?’) and the likes of Kirsty Hughes (who knows her onions, I am quite sure, but is plainly pushing an ‘EU Ref first’ argument even though the Parliamentary maths and the timeframe before ‘Brexit Day’ are against its ever happening).

Erm, eh, did we Scots not vote by rather a large percentage to stay in the EU. WTF are these britnats chuntering on about, What are they doing in Edinburgh demanding that we Scots get behind them in demanding another EURef?

Well sorry , but no boys. Scotland already voted, and been ignored. We don’t need another EUref. We only need one ref to sort this, Indpendence. Takes all this nonsense away, we can choose for ourselves which way we want to go.

This problem is not of our making. It’s an English problem so thay can stew in their own juice as far as I’m concered.

Bremner and the rest of your luvvies can do us all a favour. GTF and gies peace.

Yes Arthur ,re the People’s Vote Liberation Army’s “self awareness” think it’s more how UNAWARE they are about us full stop, in fact totally disinterested in our perspective in all of this mess…..preaching to us the converted in the hope that we can influence those who they really really should be preaching to 24/7.

“How dare they” indeed….. but they “dare” because most of them have no sense of who we, the Scots, are or indeed any interest in what we want or need….they are no better than the Tory government and would happily , like the Tories, ignore us if they did not once again NEED US the SCOTS to LEAD the way. GTF and sort out this mess with those who generated it.

Chancers and Charlatans.

Am ragin at the sheer audacity of them….”How very Dare they indeed”…..

I suspect many of you like me have been asked to support a 2nd EU Referendum. My line has been to respond by saying NO unless they can give a cast iron guarantee that this time Scotland’s vote, if for remaining in EU is respected and not over-ruled by England if they vote OUT again. As a contributor said above, “Brexit is a problem created in Tory Englandshire by a coterie of extreme right wingers who have a genetic defect called ‘the Hate Johnny Foreigner gene’ aided and abetted by a mainly right wing media where most of the owners live beyond our shores and our Laws. Of course the one exception to this is the EBC whose senior management are populated by establishment place men/women and mostly products of Englandshire Public Schools like Eton etc and Cambridge/Oxford universities.

If this should go ahead I’m going to find myself on the horns of a dilemma on whether or not to break my golden rule that it is my duty to vote but we’ll see should it ever come to pass!

I think it’s a damned cheek these people turning up in Edinburgh on the same day as the Dundee march. Probably deliberate.
And I’ve had enough of luvvies telling me what to do after their 2014 spewings! No more! They are snake oil salesmen.

I know it’s a suggestion which won’t gain much traction, but we should ask Rory Bremner and “The People’s Vote” whether they would embrace the notion of an Independent Scotland, where that Independent Scotland was free to act as a buffer state between the EU and South Britain.

Everybody wins. The EU gets rid of “Rude boy UK “ and all its disruptive tendencies, Rude boy UK get’s the Brexit it wants, but crucially with a trading lifeline through “established trading traditions” with Scotland.

Scotland gets its liberty, the Union is dissolved amicably, even perhaps a degree of gratitude after Scotland magnanimously saves England from economic catastrophe, as a Sovereign European Democracy which facilitates a trading arrangement between Europe and South Britain, and the delicate issue of Ireland “divided” gets resolved when the EU border doesn’t appear either in the Irish Sea or mainland Ireland at all, but actually runs from Gretna to Berwick.

Bear in mind that I stated quite clearly that I was speculating and data would be needed to ascertain whether what I thought was correct – namely, that Scots would take either avenue (an EURef or an indyref) to avoid being taken out of the EU and left to the mercy of the Tories afterwards. I don’t think that that’s a particularly shocking thing to guess at that, though, as there is a lot of cross-over between Yes support and Remain support.

As an aside, I was also suggesting that some Scots might not be so harried about a second EURef vote if indyref2 comes first. Again, I don’t think that’s so surprising an observation – it’d be one way of escaping the Tory Brexit mess.

A people’s vote will put to the test how changeable Tories are. Even if not official there would be a push to fall in line with the rUK which might potentially narrow the gap in Scotland. Even if England becomes more pro EU there’s little chance of Brexit being revoked. More probably unofficially there’ll be an appeal to xenophobia in England to not let the dog wag the tail and Scotland decide the issue. Perhaps it’ll be far more official and blatant like the 2015 GE.

The Brexit vote had no set objective and is being used to default to a no deal by a negotiating team determined not to achieve anything. The so called People’s Vote might be touted as a chance to cancel Brexit but if ever agreed to will be used to destroy any deal.If

It might achieve it’s aim of saving the union in several ways.
If by the slimmest chance Brexit is cancelled and Scotland was instrumental an appeal to our sense of honour will be made.

Or by ensuring any official independence date for Scotland can’t happen till after the UK is no longer part of the EU. The chances of regaining EU membership will be played on in any indyref should it be allowed by a Westminster dead set on repealing human rights.

“Why do we let half-educated tenement Scots run our English press ? Because their craving for social status makes them obedient retainers ? ”
John Cleese referring to Fraser Nelson of the tortured ‘anglo’ vowels.
Esler, Bremner, Ming the Michty: ‘Obedient little retainers’ who rely on London for their wages.
WE voted Remain.
England voted Leave.
The UK is finished.
Why didn’t Rory give us one of his famous impressions of Clunking Fist Brown who promised us 100% Federalist Status by 2016?
If anyone’s got this Parcel of Rogues’ e-mail addresses, please send this excellent WoS article to their in-Box.
The UK is dead. Scotland isn’t.
The Brexshit will hit the fan in about 8 weeks time.
Fell free to pop up for the day again when the leaves are giant corn flakes on the pavement, guys.
We shall be the 28th member of the EU. England and Wales, a US protectorate.
George Galloway should have been in his home town of Dundee yesterday.
It was buzzin’.

I’m sympathetic to a peoples vote,I would vote remain again for all the good it will do when faced with overwhelming votes from the south.I realise that even if everyone else outside England voted remain,nothing would change.

I’m sure it can’t have escaped some of those prominent speakers in the peoples vote campaign,that the help given in 2014 to the Vote No to independence side by themselves, emboldened the Consrvatives,and what they threatened would happen to Scotland has actually happened to them. The UK will leave the EU.

The list of useful idiots for the tories just gets longer and longer,from uk labour to ‘scottish labour’,to the liberal democrats all over. The Tories could never have done it without them.

All the “Better Together “ from 2014 are reappearing like rats out of the sewers now they know how shit Brexit is going to be for their little Englandshire . Why the hell should we listen to their lies all over again now that they want our help now when we’ve been ignored since 2014 and 2016 .
Only Indyref2 for us now in Scotland.

Stuart , Just to let you know that I’ve just ordered 2 of your Wings flags ready for 6th October in Edinburgh.

Maybe this clamour from those leading lights of the No campaign that want a second EU referendum might work in the favour of those of us that want Independence.

According to the Rev’s polling 39% of No voters want one presumably hoping that it might result in a Remain vote and Brexit is thereby cancelled.

This has to get their hopes up that there is still a chance of staying in the EU while the prospects of a second EU vote exist. If this fails to materialise and we leave the EU with some third rate “deal” or we crash out altogether with no deal then 39% of No voters are going to be very unhappy indeed.

The options for that 39% of No voters who favour Remaing in the EU then become clear.

Support Independence for Scotland and take the only possible way of achieving membership of the EU as part of an Independent country.

Oh, that’s who Rory Bremner is. Mock the Week is it? Don’t watch it much, but don’t remember him from that, can’t be up to much. Along with some little know people, or once respected politicians.

Sorry Rev, can’t get too excited about this, it was the same trying to think of something to comment on yesterday’s Herald, I ended up with “Indeed” as a reply to a poster who point out that Dundee had 16,000 compared to a couple of hundred in Edinburgh.

In the unlikely event of an EU Ref 2 I suppose I’ll have to vote Remain again.

Just noticed that George Galloway has the same hat as Vince Cable, maybe it gets passed around for events like that.

The Union is on its way out, it’s not if it’s when. The United Kindgom ceased to exist years ago, probably the day it started with the Scottish Parliament having been dissolved illegally a day or two before. It’s actually the origin of the word “Mayday” as in Mayday Mayday Mayday meaning emergency, not a lot of people know that.

I just wish it’d stop saying Goodbye and get out of my porch, it’s making the place look untidy.

I would go for a second Euroref but only on condition that, as Auld Rock says, the Scottish vote is respected. That is, that a vote by Scotland to stay in the EU would mean at the very least a vote to stay full members of the SM and CU. The other condition would be a cast iron guarantee that the Claim of Right as recently voted through the Westminster Parliament would give us the untrammelled ability to call a referendum on Independence at any time of our choosing.

I think that would maximise the chances of a remain vote by Yes/Leavers and the onward march to independence as Scotland and rUK go their separate ways.

The crisis in the British political system is wider and deeper than merely the Brexit debacle — its essence is, that we have abandoned most of the principles and processes of parliamentary democracy. Reversing Brexit by extra-parliamentary means would not only fail to resolve this crisis, it would make it more acute.

One other thing! A second EU referendum is of course possible, so too is no deal, so too is some kind of “deal” based on Chequers and so too is another general election with no idea of where the UK is headed after that, if it happens.

So much uncertainty as to what may be coming next.

And that is precisely the reason that Nicola Sturgeon will not make any move towards announcing a second Independence referendum without knowing first the direction in which the UK is headed in any future relationship with the EU.

The right timing is that which gives the Yes side the greatest possible chances of a victory. It is not a date in the calendar.

Daisy Walker says “It wastes time and energy which could be spent on IndyRef2”

Exactly, this is ‘Better Together’ mark 2 in action (let’s face it, they never stopped after Sept 2014) If they really wanted change and another EU vote, they would be campaigning outside NO. 10. They know indyref2 is coming, they just don’t know when.

Engerland is fecked out of the EU without Scotland, we know it, they know it, but they still think there are enough of us who don’t know it.

You know it’s not that they just do not GET it….it’s that they do not WANT to GET it….It’s hey get with the programme separatists…move on they say…while hypocritically NOT moving on themselves…they actually want us to RESPECT the so called DEMOCRATIC vote in 2014 while they themselves are ALLOWED nay ENTITLED to challenge the so called DEMOCRATIC vote in 2016.

If they cannot see how hypocritical their position is in relation to this then the fault and blame lies with them NOT with us and let’s not let them muddy the waters and move the argument onto us the Scots….we have been down that road pre and post 2014 and we know the score….fooled some of us once etc etc and since then on just simply ignored those fooled the first time and the rest of us and our Scottish Government.

See this time WE are not going to be the scapegoats….there is another house that needs to put in order and sort itself out so they need NOT knock on our doors making us somehow feel as though we should feel guilty for not , once again, buying into their desperate pleas for us Scots to TRUST them and BELIEVE them…..we do not need any convincing…we got it…which is why 62%, and growing, of Scots voted to stay in the EU…we looked at who was promoting Brexit and listened to what they were saying and thought….SHITE…so wtf is YOUR problem with us…….you People’s Vote Liberation Party !!!!

Huge apologies for multiple posts today but like others on here I am bursting with rage that some of those people that came to Edinburgh yesterday were complicit in doing the very thing they accuse the LEAVE side of doing and do it on a day when another more IMPORTANT rally/march was being held in another Scottish city. THEN on twitter think it is appropriate and accurate to ATTACK Indy supporters for somehow being the PROBLEM in not wanting to support a UKOK wide initiative….really ? really ?

See this is exactly why we need WOS…to highlight this and not be like the middle class trendy Indy mob who pander to popular trends ….it’s truth we need and the chancers exposed not part time camp fire Kumbaya clueless preachers who disappear and become silent when those of us in Scotland need THEM to support OUR position in Scotland in relation to the political UKOK’s dominating and unreasonable stance towards us….fat fcuking chance though is there…..which is why I refuse to be conned by them or talked down to….especially when I know tis not me or my fellow Scots who are the problem here.

Hope my anger is coming through via my words cause this is a beep beep disgrace….and if you are not angry about this then by Christ you should be.

Will I self combust….no…..but am at risk of my blood pressure accelerating to a dangerously high level very much thanks to the dangerously high level of whataboutery being currently deployed against people like me from people like them !

Yip I know it’s that old US and THEM….but it really is and always has been ….isn’t it…thanks to THEM !!!!!!

Not one poll gives Yes the lead in any second indyref and unless the SNP or at least the SNP and Greens win a majority in the next Holyrood referendum there will not be a mandate for one either and certainly not one Westminster will accept.

At the moment it is more likely we end up with a Chequers Deal Brexit which most grudgingly accept bar diehard Remainers and diehard No Deal Leavers

Not one poll gives Yes the lead in any second indyref and unless the SNP or at least the SNP and Greens win a majority in the next Holyrood election there will not be a mandate for one either and certainly not one Westminster will accept.
At the moment it is more likely we end up with a Chequers Deal Brexit which most grudgingly accept bar diehard Remainers and diehard No Deal Leavers

Not one current indyref2 poll has Yes ahead and there will not be another indyref unless the SNP or at least the SNP and Greens win a majority at the next Holyrood election and Westminster accepts it.

In any case it looks like there will be a Chequers Deal terms Brexit most bar the most diehard Remainers who want to reverse Brexit and the most diehard Leavers who want no Deal with the EU at all will grudgingly accept

Also worth mentioning that the indyref vote was implemented – Scotland remained in the union. The Brexit vote has not yet been implemented. If England wants to vote again on Brexit good luck to them, I’m more interested in Scotland regaining its democracy.

Also worth mentioning that the indyref vote was implemented – Scotland remained in the union.

That is what IndyRef began life as … Indy versus a simple status quo, remain in union.

By the time the vote came, no one was offering the status quo. A NO vote then came with all sorts of desirable but ill defined goodies. None less so than an absolutely clear statement that NO guaranteed EU membership. Their NO win was bought with many promises and truth is, only one has been fully implemented – staying in the Union!

If they had stuck with NO meaning just staying in the Union and nothing else, they would have lost.

I would put it differently. Both referendums were won on false promises. I make the point above in a previous comment, that IndyRef promises were actually possible, while EURef promises were always impossible.

I agree that EURef2 should be of little interest to Scotland, we have bigger fish needing fried.

Clicked on the first item in the Rev’s post above. Tanja somebody or other’s twitter appeared. I read a very large number of polite put-downs in tweets by loads of pro-independence folk. They now have all disappeared and there is a message saying this account’s tweets are protected. Am I doing something wrong e.g. not accessing these properly (I am not on Twitter) or has she pulled up the drawbridge?

Wanting to remain part of one political union but leave another was, I suppose, a kind of circle that needs to be squared. (ignoring the apples and oranges thing for a moment).

Ironically the squaring of that circle just so happens to be a square, the square mile in the city of London.

Of course, with Brexit the circle is already broken, it is no longer a choice between leaving one of two unions but remaining in the other. It is now (unless Brexit is abandoned) mathematically impossible to remain in both.

So the alleged inconsistency(ignoring the apples and oranges thing again for the sake of ludicrous argument) no longer even exists.

The London elite will never see that they are the whole of the problem. Cannae get on wi the neeburs in the flat, its their fawt, cannae get on wi the neeburs in the street, its their fawt an a.

From the perspective of post-colonial feminism and influenced by educational theory, British nationalism articulates an inherent, pervasive, all-encompassing “privileging” of English culture and practice. As such, it is only natural that it turns even the self-identified ‘liberal’ into cultural chauvinists and blood-and-soil thinkers lacking in self-awareness. Self-identified Marxists aren’t guilt free, as they will always oppose the ‘neoliberal EU’, ignoring the fact that Her Majesty’s Government adopted neoliberalism as the form of national government and management, back in 1976 – the IMF demanded it as a condition of financing broken Britain. English Marxists still need to be English nationalists, first and foremost, in order to sell themselves to ‘moderates’ living in England, which they need to do in order to gain power.

INTRODUCTION: POWER, CULTURE, HEGEMONY

Extract: Conceptions of power in the social sciences have undergone significant changes during the last twenty-five years. Above all, sensitivity to the salience of communication and culture in the exercise of power has increased. An early overview was given by Michèle Lamont in a previous volume of this Yearbook (Lamont, 1989), where she delimited four fields of investigation: Cultural industries as an arena for power struggles; Knowledge and aesthetic competence serving as resources in the exercise of power; Cultural power exerted indirectly by modes of definition; and finally, Power by means of exclusion – exclusion of people or ideas.

Investigating hegemony struggles:
A perspective on cultural political economy and its potential synergies

Abstract

Against the background of enduring crisis dynamics, an increasingly popular (neo-)Gramscian line of interpretation has the merit of shedding light on the ambivalences of the present political scenario as a series of ongoing struggles for hegemony. Yet how to concretely conceive, structure and operationalize empirical investigations interested in these struggles? I suggest that cultural political economy (CPE), historical materialist policy analysis (HMPA) and critical discourse analysis (CDA) of practical argumentation can be productively combined into a transdisciplinary research framework for critical policy analysis focused on conflicts over the making and challenging of hegemony. The first synergy between CPE and HMPA, I argue, can further enhance the analytical strength of CPE empirical analyses and their operationalization. The second synergy between CPE/HMPA and CDA of practical argumentation, in turn, can strengthen the first two in addressing questions of strategy and strategic action in the vaster domain of hegemony struggles.

ABSTRACT The concept of cultural hegemony is much broader than that of ideology, because it refers to the construction process of the collective experience, of the modelling of meanings, from the development of values, the creation of world conceptions and of the moral, cultural and intellectual direction of society through education. In this paper, the evolution of this concept is analysed from its origins to its configuration as a method of study in Cultural Studies by Antonio Gramsci and later, to its articulation through a system of representations, a discourse framed by political forces via an entire system of thought in Critical Pedagogy. According to Lorenzo Milani, this ´Pedagogy against Empire´ searches for an approach to learning for social justice, emphasises the collective dimension of learning and action, and reflects the struggle for school and social reform. This education will combine instruction or a purely technical approach with a humanistic education, brooking no differentiation or social division between manual and intellectual work where the union between theory and action is perceived as key to
understanding reality and, at the same time, to transform it.

OT – re the BBC Newspapers page. It shows the front page of the Scottish Sunday Mail with a picture of a Yemeni child holding up a piece of shrapnel with the serial number of a bomb dropped by Saudi Arabia which killed 40 children.

As DMH points out upthread, Ratheon in Fife was given pubic money to diversify away from manufacturing weapons. I would guess that Labour and the unions are adamant that Ratheon get support.

Strangely, I can’t find this article on the Daily Mail site (not a place I visit often). They do have articles about how the bomb was manufactured in the US by Lockheed Martin, but nothing on the Scotland connection.

Nor on the fact that defence is a reserved matter, that sales of bombs to Saudi Arabia are a Westminster matter. Just smear by implication.

The Chequers Deal has already been knocked back by the EU – impossible in this day and age to separate trade in Goods and Services, would have implications for the integrity of the EU Trading Blocks also.

It does – as if we didn’t need reminding – highlight the ineptitude of the WM negotiating ‘strategy’. They haven’t got one. They don’t know, they don’t understand, and they don’t actually care, how the EU functions.

Eg You cannot have a Canadian Plus, Plus type agreement, because the original Canadian EU deal has a protection cause written into it, which means if the EU offers someone else better terms or a better deal, they come back to the drawing table and arrange the same benefits.

The only consistency displayed by WM negotiators is – reject anything and everything which involves the European Court of Justice, because with it comes the legislation to tackle the Off Shore Tax Havens.

If the EU did not exist, we would be looking to invent it. Imagine trying to sell widgets to countries in Europe and needing different Health and Safety standards for every country, and settle disputes in every different countries legal courts.

If you want frictionless trade,

you need for your standards to be agreed at one place
you need for your standards to be checked at place of production, not the ports
You need authorised bodies, certified by one agreed industry body, to carry out these checks

A good example is milk production, the cows are in a system where their birth, country of origin, pedigree, haulage, vet history is known and recorded
At the dairy, the milk is harvested by machinery engineered to an agreed standard, cleaned to an agreed standard, the milk is tested at Dairy to an agreed standard, then it is transported out, by hauliers working with equipment and hygiene requirements that are met and tested – to an agreed standard.

And even with all these checks, it is not full proof – foot and mouth disease. Remember that?

Before the EU, we had Thats’ Life on TV and every week Ester Ransom introduced another tragedy, some bairn permanently disabled due to sucking on a toy covered in lead paint, some poor family burned to death due to flammable coverings on the furniture, or dodgy Christmas lights. We all love to have a good mump and moan about Health and Safety gone mad, but it didn’t come about by accident. It came about because of accident after accident, death after death, tragedy after disaster.

Long Distance Drivers – driving for days at a time with no rest, causing accidents, Junior Doctors working 18 hours straight and somehow being expected to save lives, Fire Alarms and CO2 monitors, the water we drink, the air we breath, the food standards we enjoy, the ability to read the contents of what is in the food and medicines and cosmetic products we take. Car safety. The standards used to label chemicals consistently, their safe legal handling and transporting, the list goes on and on.

I wouldn’t trust the WM lot to run a bath.

A soft Brexit – which means a Norway type deal, amounts to a 2% cut in GPD (Westminster figures).

This is the same as the cut experienced, and still being experienced by the 2008 Bankers crash. As a public sector worker, I honestly don’t see how we can take austerity cuts all over again. This, this will be the end our all our public sector services.

A Hard Brexit 8% – and 2.7 million job losses.

One day, an independent Scotland might like to look at a Norway type set up, and if we do (and it might be a good idea) I’d want to see the workings, the business plan, the positives and the negatives. There’s not a hope in hell of us getting that type of info with WM or from the Scottish Government with the current media set up.

Maybe the Britnats are pockling the polls in the same way you listed your comments x 3.

Campaigns change polls – get it – or do you check a poll to see if you will burn your toast before putting the bread in the toaster in the morning. If you are for independence and not a Britnat troll then get a grip with the negativity. If you are a Britnat troll – pissoff.

I note that Rory Bremner has taken to Tweetland to call Stu Campbell a ‘WIZARD’ (his caps) for the Rev’s 19th September 2014 prediction that the Red Tories and the Yellow Tories would die, for siding with the Blue Tories in a Better Together project Fear Campaign, the Tories would win the next GE, hold and EU Referendum to fend off UKIP,and Leave would win.

Bremner turns up in Edinburgh, speaks to bemused Japanese festival goers for ten minutes, tweets a few nonsense tweets, then fucks back off to his mansion in the Borders.
The man with the Oxbridge accent and the manners of the Elite Home Counties set has spoken.
How could we have been so wrong?

Weasel words from the privileged few.
Feck right off.
You are not welcome here.

Btw, this ongoing instruction on spotting and dealing with trolls has gotten me a bit edgy. Honest, I’m not a troll though I acknowledge I can go on a bit. Paranoid, me? 😉

Paulo Freire and the Role of Critical Pedagogy

Critical pedagogy is a teaching method that aims to help in challenging and actively struggling against any form of social oppression and the related customs and beliefs. It is a form of theory and practice which serves to let pupils gain a critical awareness Critical pedagogy is a type of pedagogy in which criticism of the established order and social criticism are essential. Critical pedagogy wants to question society in its understanding of the role that education has. From this point of view, social critique is necessary if one does not want an upbringing and education that contributes to the reproduction of inequality….

The most graphic and telling evidence supporting Health and Safety is the 3 Bridges at South Queensferry.
Rail Bridge, 19thC, 77 died
Road Bridge, mid-20thC, 7 died
Crossing, 21stC, 2 died and one of those was the result of illness not of an accident.

A lot of people invoke H&S as an excuse for banning something which has nothing to do with H&S eg Schools banning conkers is one example. The H&S inspectors got so fed up with that being blamed on them that they sponsored the Conker World Championships and entered a team.

Without the standards set by the EU we are going to be eating God knows what imported from God knows where and reared in conditions we know nothing about and can’t control. Beggars can’t be choosers is the UK’s no deal Brexit position in a nutshell

The EU is set to allow the UK to stay in the single market for goods but leave the single market for services as the Chequers Deal still ends free movement even if it has regulatory alignment for goods

Please, in the interest of accuracy, can we Stop calling those who wish to keep Scotland subjugated under English rule “Unionists”. They don’t believe or campaign for Scotland to be EQUAL. They don’t want Scotland to have the same numbers of MP’s as England, represented in Westminster, that’s true equality. They don’t support Scotland collecting all England’s revenue and taxes then giving them a portion of their own revenues and calling it a “Grant”, as they do to us at present. That would clearly be MADNESS, but it’s the situation THEY want for us and insist if we don’t subscribe to this continued insanity, we are Nationalists and anti English. They do want to keep England in control and Scotland in a quaint wee tartan box, overlaid by their “Union” flag. These people are not UNIONISTS. They are DEMOCRACY DENIERS, COLONIALISTS and if Scottish, COLONIALIST ENABLERS.
Each and every one of those speakers at the Edinburgh gathering know we voted to Remain, yet not one of them supports our democratic and SOVEREIGN will to Remain in the EU. This is a blatantly UNDEMOCRATIC.

I’m not a Nationalist. I want my country to be a NORMAL, democratic country that gets the government we elect, not our neighbours forced upon us. This is NORMAL not Nationalism. This is seeking DEMOCRACY. Those who don’t want this are undemocratic. They’re not normal. They are ANTI Scottish. They are UNDEMOCRATIC. They’re BRITNATS, ENGLISH NATIONALISTS, Democracy Deniers and either COLONIALISTS or COLONIALIST DENIERS.

There’s never been a true Union between Scotland and England, just a sleekit, corrupt OCCUPATION.

They only way Scotland will ever have democracy is to be a NORMAL, self governing country.

We’ve been told that “Britain” is leaving the EU. Regardless of the outcome of Westminster’s EU exit, we have been DENIED our SOVEREIGN and DEMOCRATIC will. So let’s drop the fantasy of the Union and Unionists. If they don’t like the other labels we ascribe to them, then they should CHANGE THEIR WAYS and attitudes towards us, or at least stop lying to themselves.

As I have said before I oppose a “UK wide” brexit referendum or “People (of England) vote” in the strongest possible terms because:

1. Scotland voted loud and clear to remain in the EU. Recent polls show clearly that even a higher majority than in 2016 now supports remaining in the EU: if Scotland has not changed its mind, where exactly is the justification to drag the people of Scotland into another vote? Using the words of the Britnats themselves: “wasn’t it a once in a generation vote?”

2. For as long as Scotland is denied a properly democratic vote by England MPs and is forced to vote as England’s region, there is absolutely no point whatsoever for Scotland in bothering to take part in any UK wide vote anymore because the result will be inevitably what the majority in England will vote for: in the EU ref of 2016, even if the entire electorate of Scotland had voted to remain the result would not have changed. So why bother?

3. As we saw in 2016, England MPs overruled our democratic vote because “it was not the right one”. So why bother? So they can give us the pleasure of overruling our vote yet again and tell us without words just how insignificant our vote is? No thanks.

4. Scotland’s electorate, majority of MSPs and MPs did not give consent for A50 to be triggered, never mind for Scotland to be dragged out of the EU without mandate or consent. Yet, England MPs not only denied the sovereign people of Scotland of a brexit veto, but also gave themselves absolute power to force Scotland out of the EU even when England MPs do not hold the mandate of a single vote from Scotland. So what is the farce for? To remind us what England MPs think of Scotland’s sovereignty? No thanks.

5. If what all those people are really interested in is a change of heart in England, why continue with this farce of dragging Scotland into the vote when there is absolutely no justification for it whatsoever? How about growing some balls and asking directly to the people of England if they have actually changed their mind? Why are these britnats so frightened to face up the English people? Why do they have to hide constantly behind Scotland?

Because if only England (and Wales) vote, the britnats cannot longer have their cake and eat it: leaving the EU and keeping the UK intact. That is why. That is why they rather push Scotland towards a referendum (Scotland only has 5 million people) that they feel they can manipulate than facing the real angry beast, England, and then going through the painful process of telling the constituents that put them in those seats that the cannot have what they want. Of course it is much easier for these cowards to say no to Scotland, because no matter what Scotland votes for, it will not affect them.

So I say, no thanks. Grow the balls and ask England. Scotland’s answer was loud and clear first time round.

Dave McEwan Hill says:
19 August, 2018 at 7:41 pm
“The reversal of the Brexit process would have benefit for the independence campaign (apart from riots in English cities).”

Dave, with all due respect, but I think you are simply making castles in the air.
What makes you think England really has changed its mind significantly to move that result over?
What if this “People’s vote” is yet another stitch up for Scotland?
As we stand, Scotland has not given consent for A50 to be triggered nor for the UK to be dragged out of the EU. the Parliament of the Uk upheld the Claim of Right of Scotland very recently. This means that as of today, dragging the UK of of the EU, never mind Scotland, without the consent of the sovereign people of Scotland or their legitimate representatives is at the very least questionable from a legitimate and democratic point of view because it goes against that Claim of Right. So the only thing that so called “people’s vote” is really going to do is legitimise brexit for Scotland by the backdoor. That is why it is really unionists pushing this and they are so desperate to get Scotland to take part on it. The way I see it, it is a trap, a unionist trap.

We should refuse to take part in this farce in the strongest possible terms. It is not Scotland who needs to change its mind but England. Therefore those unionists should grow some balls and ask England what it wants:

1. To dissolve the UK so they can leave the EU
2. To remain in the EU so the UK remains intact.

‘As we stand, Scotland has not given consent for A50 to be triggered nor for the UK to be dragged out of the EU. the Parliament of the Uk upheld the Claim of Right of Scotland very recently. This means that as of today, dragging the UK of of the EU, never mind Scotland, without the consent of the sovereign people of Scotland or their legitimate representatives is at the very least questionable from a legitimate and democratic point of view because it goes against that Claim of Right. So the only thing that so called “people’s vote” is really going to do is legitimise brexit for Scotland by the backdoor. That is why it is really unionists pushing this and they are so desperate to get Scotland to take part on it. The way I see it, it is a trap, a unionist trap.’

Very interesting view MariaF. Hadn’t thought of that aspect. That would explain the establishment leaving this campaign so late in the day – they don’t actually want it to win, just pressurise the Scots into agreeing to it.

There was an interesting tweet from MrMalkie? re who is organising the ‘peoples vote’ Long list of old familiar faces from New Labour time and the LibDems of course. Mandelson’s name came up.

It’s all about the timing surely? Independence first or our EU membership? However in all likelihood if a referendum of any sort does take place it will be on the EU issue. It is a given that only the vote of the English counts regardless of any Scot’s stance, either Pro or Anti. But if, as some still expect, the Leave camp win the vote then the nature of UK politics and in all probability UK “society” will change quite rapidly. in short order WM will move to make any possible Indy Ref well nigh impossible to conduct on any meaningful basis.
We may say ignore the “Peoples Vote” but to do so would open us up to claims that we’re no longer motivated by the issue (regardless of the validity or otherwise of the claim). Furthermore it would give some in the EU reason to give consideration to the worth or otherwise of supporting Scotland’s cause when we may have even greater need of their assistance than we do at present.
A bit like non voters in any standard election if you ignore the political situation around you and choose not to vote then don’t be surprised if your views are disregarded or overlooked entirely at a later point.
A lot of us don’t want anything to do with a “People’s Vote” because it is a problem made by the English for themselves by themselves. But to ignore it isn’t going to help the Indy cause.

Therefore, in the event of a hard Brexit being forced upon Scotland against the will of a two-thirds majority…

EVERY SNP MP & MSP MUST RESIGN…

and stand for re-election on a single-issue ticket of an SNP Holyrood Govt. forming a Scottish Grand Committee to negotiate the repeal of the 1707 Act & Articles of Union with England, AND entering into negotiation with the EU to enter into either full EU or EEA membership.

If the SNP get wiped out, then we’ll have nobody to blame but ourselves. Anything else is simply rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

Not sure about that Archie. From where I am standing it very much looks like it is all about smoke and mirrors. Take a look at the “polls”: Scotland has not changed its mind, in fact, the support for the EU has even increased. So what makes you think England has changed its point of view? Don’t you remember what project fear did to Scotland? It made the desire for independence stronger.

I think those behind the “People’s vote” are simply showing us a mirage. I saw somewhere that they were talking about MP constituencies changing their vote intent. But if there is a new vote, it will not be MP constituencies what would count in the final vote, it will be the constituencies that were used for the first EU referendum. Now, did any of those actually changed at all? I think you find not.

I am with Daisy Walker on this. England will vote to leave again and the England MPs will be safe in their seats but this vote will be used to legitimise brexit for Scotland by the back door. Because keeping control of Scotland’s precious assets is all what this is about. Look how quickly they moved to seize the 24 powers and neuter our continuity bill. From where I am standing this “people’s vote” is yet another britnat ruse to stop Scotland having an independence referendum.

“We may say ignore the “Peoples Vote” but to do so would open us up to claims that we’re no longer motivated by the issue”

Alternatively it may send the message that we are not longer that easy to be fooled, that we are far too motivated to be ignored and that we are fed up of being overruled and dictated by England MPs.

“Furthermore it would give some in the EU reason to give consideration to the worth or otherwise of supporting Scotland’s cause when we may have even greater need of their assistance than we do at present”
Sorry, I think this excuse is not good enough to being fooled into legitimise by the back door a brexit we voted strongly against and that is being used to transfer power from the Scottish Parliament onto England MPs without our consent. The EU people are not stupid, Archie. They will understand this.

“A bit like non voters in any standard election if you ignore the political situation around you and choose not to vote then don’t be surprised if your views are disregarded or overlooked entirely at a later point”

The negative to this vote must come not only from the voters but also from the Scottish government and the Scottish Parliament.

“A lot of us don’t want anything to do with a “People’s Vote” because it is a problem made by the English for themselves by themselves. But to ignore it isn’t going to help the Indy cause”

Quite frankly, Archie, refusing to accept that there is any justification whatsoever for this vote in Scotland when Scotland voted to remain in the EU loudly and clear first time round and every poll show that the intention of vote has not changed is not “ignoring” this vote, it is discrediting this vote and understanding that it is not appropriate for Scotland to have it.
Refusing to have this vote on the grounds that it is only England’s vote that counts because Scotland will be forced to vote as England’s property is not “ignoring” the point, it is highlighting that there is no democracy for Scotland in the UK and therefore it is not longer worth for Scotland participating in the vote.

Now, how exactly is accepting to be used, yet again, as scapegoats and shields for England MPs that do not have the balls to actually ask the question to their own constituents for fear of being ejected of their comfortable seats, helpful for independence?

How exactly is accepting to be dictated and ruled by England MPs we do not elect time and time again helpful for independence?

How exactly is accepting that England MPs can simply walk over our sovereignty and claim of right whenever they please, going to help us to become independent?

Sorry, Archie, but the way I see it, the only possible way we can demand respect from others is if we respect ourselves first. Letting England MPs and politicians walking over us and ransack our country every time England gets into trouble without putting up a fight is not respecting ourselves.

@robertknight
On the other hand, if Westminster says no, Holyrood goes ahead anyway, it’s challenged in court, there are the usual delays, the case isn’t heard until March, the decision isn’t until July 2019, and meanwhile the UK can’t Brexit in March according to its Constitution, which is the requirement for the Article 50 invocation in the first place.

Even the danger of that is why I think Westminster will push an S30 through as emergency legislation.

HYUFD says:
19 August, 2018 at 8:08 pm
“Juan What about Bavaria, Catalonia, Venice Quebec etc which were all independent once too?”

Why stop there Kurdistan, Basque …..
This is the Wings Over Scotland blog not Wings Over Bavaria! I still believe and stand by EVERY country should govern themselves and have the government THEY ELECT EVERY TIME, not a larger neighbours forced upon them. I don’t dictate what others should do. That’s up to them. I choose democracy over DICTATORSHIP EVERY time. How about you?
You’re either struggling with the concept of democracy or country. Which is it?
Is Scotland a country? Why shouldn’t we govern ourselves?

If it gets to court, the SG will lose as the precedent was set with the Edinburgh Agreement, and there’s nothing that English Law, and that includes the UKSC, loves more than a legal precedent. You’ll be in a Cataluña/Madrid scenario quicker than you can say ‘Nigel Farage is an arse’ if the SG goes ahead without an agreement. (Yoon led local authorities would also refuse to open polling stations).

The SNP’s elected representatives should take the ‘nuclear option’. It’ll be all or nothing – if we’re dragged out the EU, subject to a hard Brexit, and denied Indyref2, then there’s nothing left to play for anyway. We’re all f******

Forgot to include the likelihood that the UK Govt. would railroad any legal case against the SG through the UKSC itself in double quick time to ensure Brexit wasn’t delayed, in the ‘National Interest’ of course.

I find it very strange that they launched this ‘peoples vote’ in Scotland’s capital city.

There seems to be a who’s who, of MI6 types, from the Better Together campaign, who have came from nowhere to tell us Scots we need to have another EU referendum. (even though we voted in overwhelming numbers to remain in the EU! )

Am I being overly cynical, when I say that I am highly suspicious that some ‘Internal Polling’ may be showing a shift from Soft No’s to Yes, as people in Scotland see the damage that the increasingly likely Hard Brexit will do us (and is already doing us)

Can it be that in their desperation to stop any gathering momentum towards Yes, they have started this campaign in order to convince the Soft No’s that Brexit may still be avoided?

Remember, soft No’s, are Scots who were able to be frightened by ‘Project Fear’ so are the very people who are most likely to switch from No to Yes, if they feel even more frightened of a future under Brexit conditions.

HYUFD says:
19 August, 2018 at 8:08 pm
Juan What about Bavaria, Catalonia, Venice Quebec etc which were all independent once too?

Why stop there? Kurdistan, Basque ….. This is the Wings Over SCOTLAND blog not Wings Over Babaria! I stand by EVERY country should govern themselves and have the government THEY ELECT EVERY TIME, not a larger neighbours forced upon them. I choose democracy over DICTATORSHIP EVERY time. How about you?
You’re either struggling with the concept of democracy or country. Which is it?
Is Scotland a country? Why shouldn’t we govern ourselves?

Juan Scotland voted in 2014 by a clear 10% margin to stay in the UK but my point proves that the concept of a nation state is fluid and often evolves over centuries. There is a contradiction between an increasingly globalised world and an obsession with nationalism and that includes Trump and hard Brexiteers as much as Catalan or Bavarian Nationalists or the Bloc Quebecois

Jim Half the military officers, civil servants, engineers and merchants who created the British Empire were Scottish, what an absurd point. If Scotland is a colony how come it has its own Parliament, unlike England, while also sending MPs to Westminster too?

HYUFD says:
20 August, 2018 at 12:20 am
“Juan Scotland voted in 2014 by a clear 10% margin to stay in the UK but my point proves that the concept of a nation state is fluid and often evolves over centuries. There is a contradiction between an increasingly globalised world and an obsession with nationalism and that includes Trump and hard Brexiteers as much as Catalan or Bavarian Nationalists or the Bloc Quebecois.”

Scots didn’t vote to be taken out of the EU, nor did they vote for EVEL (English Votes for EVERY Law), or for reduced powers, nor any of the other multitude of broken promises. According to you, we should accept a foreign country who lies to us,dictating to Scots. Also according to you Scots aren’t SOVEREIGN and Scotland isn’t a country! Nor are we a colony, because some Scots were /are colonialist enablers and “bought and sold” worked for Greater England’s empire. This isn’t proof of anything. Other than the corruption of the weak and greedy’s ability to sell out their own. Many countries such as Italy and Germany are modern constructs. That doesn’t mean they’ll survive as countries forever. Look at Yugoslavia, USSR, even Russia has “areas”that want to break free. This is simply your OPINION. It’s just the opinion of ONE COLONIALIST and DEMOCRACY DENIER. Democracy didn’t die in September 2014, it just didn’t begin. It’s been postponed only.

I’m not a Nationalist. I’m SEEKING DEMOCRACY and NORMALITY. My country is under occupation, not in a Union. We have no say and are outnumbered by an inherently anti Scottish Treaty, 533 MP’s from England against 59 MP’s from Scotland. This isn’t and never has been equal or a Union. It was an occupation by stealth and corruption. It was against the peoples will at the time. Nothing has changed since.

I think you’ll find a majority of Scots won’t accept being England’s colony. The question next time should be “Should Scotland be a normal, self governing country or England’s colony?” I’d like to see you and the colonialists and their colonialist media sell that to Scots. I know I can convince even those of the Orange Order, that Scotland is a colony, and turn them away from the Darkside, though unfortunately not all of them. In practice a third will support independence in one ten minute conversation. Another third will swither, some of them will be convinced by the first third and the last third will threaten to kill. These are the diehard Colonialist enablers. These are the hardcore support for colonialist rule. Like you they are DEMOCRACY DENIERS.

EVERYONE but the hardcore brainwashed can be convinced to vote for Scottish independence. The hardcore aren’t that many. 150,000 OO in Scotland and not all of them would vote to be England’s colony.

HYUFD says:
20 August, 2018 at 12:20 am
“Scotland voted in 2014 by a clear 10% margin to stay in the UK”

On a platform of blatant lies, deception and a myriad of broken promises. That, in any other context, amounts to fraud.

“Jim Half the military officers, civil servants, engineers and merchants who created the British Empire were Scottish”

As many, many soldiers that fought on the side of the UK on WW1 and WW2 were not from the UK but from its colonies. What is your point?

“If Scotland is a colony how come it has its own Parliament”
Because it was designed to give the illusion of Labour tackling the staggering democratic deficit Scotland is subjected to within the UK and more importantly, it was thought that would stop the pro-independence movement. It failed.

“unlike England”
Because England is using the UK parliament as if it was its own. Take a look at how they calculate the Barnet consequentials. England is always allocated 100% devolution.

“while also sending MPs to Westminster too?”
Because if Scotland did not send MPs to Westminster the UK would be over. The only reason why those MPs are there is to keep the illusion of democracy for Scotland. But just tell me one, one single example where that UK parliament voted in favour of Scotland’s and against England’s interests. You will not find one. All the examples you will find are of England MPs gagging Scottish ones and quashing Scotland’s will sacrificing Scotland’s interests for the benefit of England’s one. With over 80% of the seats, the UK parliament is acting as England’s parliament. If you consider that NI and Wales are part of the Kingdom of England, then you realise that the “UK Parliament” is really the Kingdom of England’s Parliament with 90% of the seats. It is a farce.

Juan Scotand voted 63% for Unionist parties even after Brexit. Your country is also in no way colonised or in occupation, for starters Scots have their own Parliament at Westminster which decides most domestic policy while also sending MPs to Westminster. In fact Scotland’s situation increasingly resembles that of a state i ln a Federal nation like Germany. Of clurse y sstartersGermany

Maria F Scotland voted No despite am aggressive Yes campaign as it was happy with its own Parliament which decided most domestic policy. At most most Scots want devomax not full independence. In 1974 England voted Tory and got a Labour PM and Scotland voted Labour and got a Labour PM. From 2007 to 2010 the UK had a Scottish PM who spent heavily in Scotland

If a second referendum stopped Brexit, then Scottish independence wouldn’t be more difficult. Since the whole of the British Isles would remain in the single market, no new barriers would be created if Scotland became independent again. So that argument falls…

There are NO UNIONISTS, the Union is an allusion. It’s COLONISATION by stealth, cause you couldn’t do it the old fashioned way.
“Your country is also in no way colonised or in occupation,..”
So Scotland Is a country! “…for starters Scots have their own Parliament at Westminster which decides most domestic policy while also sending MPs to Westminster. In fact Scotland’s situation increasingly resembles that of a state i ln a Federal nation like Germany.”
Where is this “Scotland’s own parliament at WESTMINSTER”? Now moving on to the Federalism LIE. The UK isn’t federalist. Our parliament is devolved and power devolved is power retained. Westminster dictates 80% of Scotland’s laws and collects ALL our revenue and Taxes. This is neither NORMAL nor Federalism. It’s colonialism.

I was astonished to learn that Esler and Bremner regard themselves as Scots. They are not Scots, but that strange minority of a minority, the Anglo Scot. I realise that for many years I have been doing English people a grave disservice in confusing them with the Anglo Scot. It is the Anglo Scot who has been the bane of my life, constantly putting me and my kind down. Not ordinary English people. Because English people by and large are simply indifferent to Scotland. The Anglo Scot however is actually an active Anti-Scot who is instinctively afraid of anything genuinely Scottish in case it leads to independence and reveals their inauthenticity. Because then they would be out of a job and out of a country, since they are neither Scots nor English, but a kind of colonial elite who owe their position in the social hierarchy to keeping the natives in check.

Glad I gave that demo a miss. There can be no collaboration between Scots and Anti Scots, even over Brexshit. I laughed to see how their paltry demo was given major coverage by their colonial agents dan sath when the indy demo of 15,000 in Dundee on Saturday was ignored. Hell mend them.

HYUFD says:
20 August, 2018 at 12:14 pm
“In no way is Scotland a colony given Scots have representatives in their own Parliament and at Westminster and also given 55% of Scots voted to stay in the Union in 2014.”
As has already been pointed out to you, Scots didn’t vote for LESS POWERS but for a LIE named “The Vow” which promised FULL FISCAL AUTONOMY, which hasn’t been delivered, not has the 13 shipbuilding contract, tax jobs removed from Scotland to Croydon in ENGLAND, not did we vote for the power grab or to leave the EU. Like your colonialist propaganda outlets, you’re just repeating the same shite. It was shite the first time you said it.
A colony is any country or area that’s either partially or completely politically dominated by another country. Scots voted to REMAIN in the EU yet are being FORCED out by ENGLAND.

“Holyrood determines most Scottish domestic policy including education, justice and health and has power to vary income tax within a preset range.” This is not most domestic laws though is it? At least 80% of our laws are DICTATED to us by a parliament in a FOREIGN country where we have minimum representation. Even colonies decide on some domestic issues.

Now that you’ve conceded that Scotland is a country. Why shouldn’t we govern ourselves like a NORMAL country?

And? A GE is not a referendum, HYUFD. If you want a proper referendum you have to have one with a defined question/s and not make a GE do as one using the manifesto of the parties as “the question”. That is ridiculous. Bizarrely, the 3 British Nationalist parties aka Labour, Conservatives and LibDem appear to be completely terrified of an independence referendum. You would expect that at least Labour and LibDems, as allegedly democratic parties that are quite happy to celebrate the independence of pretty much everyone, would support self determination for Scotland too. Apparently not. This enormous discordance between how they attempt to present themselves to the world and who they really behave towards Scotland does not make any sense whatsoever in modern democracy. The only way you can explain it from the perspective that these 3 parties are not really 3 parties but, when it comes to Scotland, just one.

“Your country is also in no way colonised or in occupation”
Well, that is a matter of opinion.

“Scots have their own Parliament at Westminster”
Where do you live, HYUFD? So you even live in the UK? The Parliament of Scotland is Holyrood, not Westminster. Holyrood is in Scotland, in Edinburgh. Westminster is the Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and NI but it is used as if it was England’s parliament.

“which decides most domestic policy”
Yet, England MPs that do not hold the mandate of a single vote from Scotland, do not hesitate to overrule Scotland’s democratic will and walk all over our Claim of right without our consent to steal from us 24 devolved powers from our Parliament so they can transfer those powers onto themselves and with them seize control of Scotland’s assets for the benefit of England and the detriment of Scotland. If that is not colonialism HYUFD, you tell me what it is.

“while also sending MPs to Westminster”
The moment Scotland stops sending MPs to Westminster the union is over.

This stuff makes you angry, all the more so as the National party, according to rumours about conference 2018 agenda, seems to be shelving by stealth any action on independence.
We do live in interesting and perplexing times when a party dedicated to independence appears to prefer the comfort and job security of the ‘devolved option’.
Fast losing patience and trust in Nicola’s régime.

Aggressive Yes campaign? Are you having a laugh? Do you actually live here at all? Were you here in 2014 or you just were given a script of what you have to say?

Because I was here in 2014 and I can ensure you I did not feel the Yes campaign as “aggressive” at all. In fact I felt it was far too mellow and that allowed the No side to get away with murder. Why do I say this? Well, because until a few weeks before 18 September 2014 I as a convinced No voter. So much so that initially I saw the referendum with incredulity and I thought the idea of independence for Scotland was totally ridiculous. Why? because I swallowed the crap the No side was peddling and the information from the Yes side did not reach me at all. but the aggressiveness of the NO campaign was so exaggerated that even I noted that there was a total lack of balance. 99% of the information I was getting from MSM, radio, TV and in the street was from the No side. So what changed? I am a stubborn so and so that refuses to be told what to do and that tends to thing the worst of those who have something to hide. The fact that all the MSM and broadcasters were so negative towards independence made me question why. Why was I not getting the information? I started to get pissed off with the number of articles designed to create fear (food prices increase, businesses moving away, etc) But what started to turn it for me was the announcement from the MoD that they planned to allocate the 13 frigates built to Scotland, but they would “be forced” not to if Scotland became an independent country. I thought that was a pathetic example of emotional blackmailing and reminded me of the obnoxious child in the playground that runs away with his ball because the others don’t let him win every time.
Then along came the infamous article claiming that blood transfusions and organ transplants would cease in Scotland if it became independent. That turned the tide for me upside down. At that point I blatantly refused to go on supporting a side that would use such disgustingly cruel and unfounded argument to make a point. I saw that as naked blackmailing. Immediately thought that if the No side had to resource to use such dirty tactics, there must be something they were desperate to hide and to distract us from. Then along came the article in the Guardian claiming that an independent Scotland would have to pay double fee for the TV licence. That was the last straw: I never was a great fan of the BBC, but at that time I asked myself who on earth could be so arrogant (and stupid) as to think the people of Scotland would ever want to continue watching the London centric BBC when they could have their own independent channels? I thought that was utterly ridiculous and frankly, desperate.
From there that was it. I started to question every single argument, every single comment, every single article I read or hear and the truth is that they did not stand up to my scrutiny. I started to notice the pattern in the articles of the BBC, always starting with the NO side of hte story and ending with the No side of the story. I complained to the BBC countless times about this, but nothing changed. So that was it. I started to conduct my own research and I have not looked back every since. Now I see some of the articles and I wonder how I could have been so blind to have fallen for that crap.

So stop talking bllocks, HYUFD. The YES campaign was not aggressive at all. It was no near as aggressive as it should have been to counteract the bile, the rubbish, the abuse of power and the disgusting emotional blackmailing used by the No side.

“At most most Scots want devomax”
And again, that was spectacularly abused by the No side to manipulate and deceive the electorate in Scotland in a unbelievably dirty way that would not be uncommon practice in a fascist state but that is outrageous and totally out of place in a so called democratic union of equals.

“In 1974 England voted Tory and got a Labour PM”
Oh dear! My heart bleeds. If England wants to get the PM they vote for every time, then they can move their collective backsides and dissolve the treaty of union themselves. Isn’t it about time a country like England, holding 85% of the electorate of Scotland and pretty much every single politician in the UK gov cabinet stop hiding behind Scotland and crying wolf?

“From 2007 to 2010 the UK had a Scottish PM”
Being born in Scotland alone does not make you Scottish. You have to earn being called Scottish. I do not think you can call “Scottish” to someone that does everything in their hand, including using deception, to stop the right of self-determination of his fellow countryman and by doing so condemning the parliament of the country to being neutered and his fellow countrymen to economic hardship at the hands of the tories. That individual is not fit to be called a “Scot”. Is a tractor to his country and I hope that is the way he will be seen by the future generations of young Scots. I will certainly ensure my children and grandchildren always remember the face of the tractor that sold his country to the tories in 2014 for the sake of a few labour seats in Westminster.

Juan I notice no mention of the eight Type 26 frigates being built at shipyards in Glasgow.

No mention either of the Scotland Act 2016 which devolved further powers to Scotland amongst which included legislative control over areas such as onshore oil and gas extraction, rail franchising, consumer advocacy and advice amongst others by devolution of powers in relation to these fields to the Ministers of the Scottish Parliament.
Management of the Crown Estate and the British Transport Police in Scotland.
Control over certain removable taxes including Air Passenger Duty.
Full control over income tax including Income Tax rates and bands on non-savings and non-dividend income.

MariaF 55% voted to stay in the Union in 2016 and if the main nationalist party can only muster 37% in the last Westminster election in Scotland and failed to get to 50% or get a majority in the last Holyrood election it has no mandate for another independence referendum.

Scots have their own domestic Parliament at Holyrood but also send MPs to Westminster as do the Welsh and Northern Irish, if Westminster was an English only Parliament the Tories would have had a majority in both 2010 and 2017.

The Scotland Act 2016 was an example of further powers being devolved to Scotland.

The Yes campaign was very aggressive in social media and drowned out the likes of Jim Murphy on the streets. It also had plenty of cash from the likes of multimillionaires Brian Souter and Sean Connery.

England gets on with it, as to be fair does Wales and NI on the whole, it is mainly nationalist Scots who whinge.

HYUFD says:
20 August, 2018 at 9:11 pm
“Juan I notice no mention of the eight Type 26 frigates being built at shipyards in Glasgow.”
Thirteen were promised only THREE have actually been ordered. Even if it turns out to be 8, the 13 was a LIE. I won’t be ruled by LIARS. I won’t be ruled by a foreign government my country have rejected. For the record I have mentioned them under shipbuilding lies “13 shipbuilding contracts” in my post at 12:48. Try READING posts you’re responding to.
“No mention either of the Scotland Act 2016 which devolved further powers to Scotland amongst which included legislative control over areas such as onshore oil and gas extraction”. Westminster has sold licences to FRACK Scotland to INEOS who also fund the Tory party. Your full of shite.
THESE are part of the POWER GRAB, along with the environment, farming, fishing and a whole range of other powers being STOLEN, not to mention the LIE that the Scottish parliament would be made PERMANENT.
“rail franchising” seriously FUCK OFF. Westminster controls and OWNS Scotland’s rail network and are responsible for most of the delays on our railways at present, but they’ll not devolve that as they can fuck up our railways with control over the Network as they do just now.
The rest of your post is drivel. I’m not going to be persuaded by crumbs off my own table.
“Management of the Crown Estate” aye cheers for that. ITS ILLEGAL. SCOTS ARE SOVEREIGN not subjects, like the people of England.
“Holyrood now controls the vast majority of Scottish domestic policy” The Scottish Office always have done because Scotland has ALWAYS been a SEPARATE Kingdom and COUNTRY, with OUR OWN LAWS, Education etc.

“For the love of the UK”. Fuck the UK. It’s been detrimental to Scotland for ALL of it’s 311 year existence and diminished Scotland on EVERY level whether that’s Physically, Politically, Environmentally, Economically, Socially and Culturally. There’s NEVER been ANY BENEFIT to Scotland from it’s UNION with England. NONE EVER!

I will NEVER support this unequal, undemocratic, unwanted, corrupt and inherently anti Scottish “Union” that deprives me and mine, of basic and fundamental HUMAN RIGHTS, like the right to choose the GOVERNMENT of my country.

So, unless you’ve got something to offer that’s BETTER THAN DEMOCRACY (fascist Tory regimes that persecute the poor and KILL THE DISABLED, don’t do it for me and neither does racism or xenophobia) do one.

You cannot even answer WHY SHOULDN’T SCOTLAND GOVERN ITSELF LIKE EVERY OTHER NORMAL COUNTRY? This is the THIRD time of asking. Got an answer yet? When you’ve got an answer to that and something better than democracy, by all means get back to me. If not, seriously FUCK OFF.
If I wanted to go round in circles with an imbecile I’d be waltzing with Boris Johnson.

8 were promised, 8 are being delivered. Given 55% of Scots backed the Union in the 2014 referendum Scotland is certainly not ruled by a foreign country Scots have rejected.

The Scotland Act 2016 delivered on the promise made at the 2014 referendum to give more powers to Scotland and confirms most domestic policy from Justice to Education to Health to Transport to Air Passenger Duty and non Savings Incone Tax is decided in Scotland. Scotland is now one of the most prosperous parts of the UK and part of a G8, G20 evonomy and a permanent mber of the UN Security Council thanks to the UK.

I know you are a whinging, miserable Nat who would still do nothing but complain even if you got independence which 55% opposed in 2014 anyway affirming the democratic mandate of the Union and you also have the right to vote in elections for both the Scottish and UK governments. Unemployment is now one of the lowest in the Western world under a Tory government. Scotland does govern itself on most domestic issues but is also part of a wider strong Union much like a former country like Bavaria is part of a Federal Germany, a former country like Venice or Naples is now part of Italy etc

The level of willful ignorance and condescension on display in your posts qualifies you as not even remotely worthy of any engagement on these threads.

Come back when you stop your lying faced brass necked thick as shit in the neck of a bottle nonsense. And get yersel back on that banana boat berthed on the clyde…ye’ve goat a few roon trips tae go collecting aw the bespoke zips ye need tae replace aw the faulty wans keepin yer daft napper the gether.

The most logical element of the independent argument is the promotion of the entrepreneurial state (Norway achieves this with its enormous state oil fund, other autonomous countries manage their own version on a smaller scale even without oil) by having control of all our legislative powers – whether its for welfare, defence, energy, immigration, agriculture our macro-economy. Piecemeal legislation means exactly that- several pieces of the bigger picture of Scotland’s potential are missing.

If it is him, *he’s even more of a cowardly little shit than ah had him pinned as. He’s never been shy of using his sd handle, why would he be in disguise now…hmmm…think ma first sentence covered that.

Phronesis I doubt the argument an independent Scotland would be an entrepreneurial, low tax, laissez faire nirvana would have much appeal to SNP voters in the Central belt and oil supplies will run out eventually

HYUFD says:
21 August, 2018 at 7:05 am
“8 were promised, 8 are being delivered.”. The LIE is YOURS. Just repeating the LIES won’t make them any less of a LIE!

“Earlier statements from the MoD outlined a planned build of 13 Type 26 Frigates would be awarded to the Clyde, a defence review and subsequent cost cutting has however stood in the way of that, is there more to it?

It’s not a “strong Union” that denies it’s citizens democracy. That’s not the sign of a strong Union but of an oppressive regimes OCCUPATION. If you and your establishment are confident of Scots being fooled twice, why not have another referendum? Not that it’s YOUR choice. We’ve already mandated our government to do so.

FOR THE FOURTH TIME OF ASKING, Why shouldn’t Scotland govern itself like a NORMAL country?

A “strong Union” is built on truth, equality and mutual respect, not lies and FEARMONGERING. 13 were promised BEFORE the referendum but now it’s reduced to 8, but not all 8 have been ordered so it could easily be reduced again.https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/clyde-build-13-type-26-frigates-clyde-changed/
“The initial Type 26 frigate order was cut back from 13 to 8 in order to fund more of the immediate spending outlined in the 2015 Strategic Defence and Security Review, a move that has been widely expected since 2013.” The LIARS KNEW there’d never be 13.

“It was a strong Union which granted Scotland an independence referendum in 2014 unlike say Spain with Catalonia.”
Westminster cannot stop Scotland having another IndyRef. The UK isn’t a country, it’s a bipartite UNION.
Westminster didn’t “grant” a referendum but signed a Section 30 that the result would be legally binding, then corrupted the referendum by driving a coach and horses through Purdah, because polls showed independence was in the lead. They then promised FULL FISCAL AUTONOMY. When will that be delivered?

Spain’s regime are FASCIST. Do you think England would do the same to Scots exercising their democratic and SOVEREIGN will? Would this be acceptable to keep your “strong Union” together? A strong Union where half of all Scots at least, want that “Union” to end. Your “Union” is as strong as Mayhem is stable.

“63% if Scots voted for Unionist parties in 2017”. There are no unionist parties, just ENGLISH Parties that LIE to the electorate, by placing Scottish in front of their names in Scotland. They’d get less support if they told the truth and they know it. That’s why they LIE.
“If you want to restore countries which were independent centuries ago like Scotland then why not Bavaria, Prussia, Naples, Venice, Aragon, Abyssinia,Texas, Persia, Wessex etc?s”
Scotland isn’t independent, but it’s ALWAYS been a country. It’s legal system has always been independent as has our education system. Scot are SOVEREIGN in Law. That TRUTH is recognised by English Law, the Treaty of Union and even by Westminster again this year.
We don’t even need Holyrood to call for the dissolving of the UK. We could do that ourselves and it’d be legally binding, as would a referendum without a Section 30, because of our legal Sovereignty.

Still waiting for the answer to WHY shouldn’t Scotland be self governing? Why can’t you answer such an easy question?

All Frigates that will be built will be built in Scotland.
Under the UK unwritten constitution Westminster comprising MPs from all 4 home countries is sovereign, Holyrood is just a subsidiary of Westminster, no different to the position between Spain’s Parliament and Catalonia’s. Only one poll the entire 2014 campaign had Yes ahead and No won by a convincing 10% margin

There’s a possibility that you are so brainwashed that you actually believe all the guff that you post on here. I’m not gonna go through all of the factual inaccuracies in your last handful of comments; I’ll just mention one.

NO PERMISSION IS NEEDED FROM THE UK PARLIAMENT FOR THE SCOTTISH PARLIAMENT TO HOLD A REFERENDUM.

The Type 31e is a frigate and nobody has a clue where it’ll be built yet as the tender has only just gone out again. And there is no guarantee that any more than 6 Type 26 will be built, or even more than the 3 currently ordered. As Dragon’s Den would say, it’s a letter of intent for any more, NOT an order. But here IS an accurate statement:

It became aware to us in Scotland during the first indyref, that the English parties, C&U, Labour and Lib-Dem (‘CULLD’), were acting together in the interests of “the union” and against the interests of Scotland.

The britnat collusion, that has carried on since 18/09/14, can be simply shown by the graphic at this link.

More lies. Scotland’s parliament was never dissolved. It was prorogued. The Treaty of Union had to be signed, out with parliament as Scots weren’t happy with treacherous MP’s who’d been bribed by England, to join in Union.
Can you point to where in the Treaty of Union that states Scotland ceases to be a country? It’s just another LIE.
Scots law is “sacrosanct in perpetuity” see Section 19 of the Treaty of Union. Under Scots law, the people of Scotland are SOVEREIGN, not parliament or Monarch and definitely not a FOREIGN parliament in a FOREIGN country.
Like you, Westminster LIE all the time about EVERYTHING. Where’s your legal document to prove any of this shit your spreading?

Scotland is definitely a country and recognised around the world as such.

Is England a country? It was for 12 days, but then it’s ONE AND ONLY ENGLISH king was killed and it became a colony of Normandy in 1066. The Normans were defeated by the French and Normandy became a region of France thereafter. Since then England’s Monarchs have never been English. You’ve had more Scots monarchs than English. You’ve been ruled over by FOREIGN aristocrats since 1066, perhaps that’s why your country is so xenophobic and racist just now. The English are struggling to assert their own Englishness and find themselves which has resulted in the self harm that “Brexit” will surely be.

If Scots organised themselves and a majority demand a dissolution of the Union, the UK would be dead. Any referendum, even an advisory referendum would be legally binding, because we are legally SOVEREIGN. Scots Claim of Rights was passed uncontested in Westminster recently:https://archive.is/JMO3Q
The 2017 UK GE was only an election. They happen all the time and nothing in one election precludes the electorate from changing their minds in the next election. In 2017 500,000 Scots chose not to support SNP because they didn’t stand on an Indy mandate. I know, I was one of those 1/2 a million. I’ll only vote for a party that stands on an Indy platform. A majority of SNP MP’s elected on an independence mandate is enough to dissolve the UK WITHOUT the need for another IndyRef. I withheld my support from the SNP because they didn’t stand on that mandate. If they had done they’d have more MP’s than now, and the “Union” with England would already be over.
Scots are SOVEREIGN not serfs or mere subjects as the English are in England. Legally your not even citizens, just chattel of of The Crown. Funny how most English are oblivious to their own legal standing yet have a massively overblown sense of self importance and arrogance. Your empire was built on this, xenophobia, the racism of white supremacy and stupidity that English are superior to all, when legally your not even citizens. Your delusions of your over inflated sense of yourselves will end the Union. You know it too, otherwise you wouldn’t be posting your lies and disinformation here.
I can smell your fear from here. Why are the English so afraid to be an independent country? Is it because you’ve no assets? Without Scotland’s vast resources you’ll never be able to clear your National Debt of £2 TRILLION?
You’d think you English would have enough problems of your own to be dealing with what with your chronic trade deficit, Irish border, cliff edge EU exit, falling £, corrupt banks, electoral corruption, stagnating economy, rising poverty, personal and National debt crisis, rising race hate crime, rising violent crime and all the rest. Seriously, you’d be better spending your energy sorting yourselves out.

Juan Scottish Parliament representatives voted in 1707 to absorb themselves into Westminster, that remains the case today. The only country recognised in GB by the UN is the UK.The Scottish people of course voted 55% for the Union in 2014’s referendum and 63% for Unionist parties at the 2017 general election so it is you ignoring their opinion not me.

Technically of course most English are of German ie Anglo Saxon or French ie Norman or Huguenot origin while Scots are Celts but what has that to do with anything? The Claim of Right is irrelevant as only SNP MPs voted and no Parliament at Westminster can bind its successors under our unwritten constitution. You of course exist on anti English hatred, most English do not exist on anti Scottish hatred.

Without Scotland England and Wales would still have 1 of the wealthiest cities in the world in London and still be in the top 10 largest global economies. Scotland would not even be in the G20. Scotland has also had its own monarchs even before joining the UK and Scots played a key part in the Empire

HYUFD says:
22 August, 2018 at 1:03 pm
“Juan Scottish Parliament representatives voted in 1707 to absorb themselves into Westminster, that remains the case today.”
Those MPs weren’t Sovereign and neither was the Scottish parliament. The people of Scotland were and still are the SOVEREIGNS of Scotland. The wee link I posted in the last post explains that.

The UK is a unitary state but not a country? Name one other country that is comprised of other countries?

HYUFD says:
22 August, 2018 at 1:06 pm
“Technically of course most English are of German ie Anglo Saxon or French ie Norman or Huguenot origin while Scots are Celts but what has that to do with anything?”
Technically? I think you mean genetically and again you’re wrong. Genetically we are from Doggerland, almost all of us regardless of which country within the UK we reside.

“The Claim of Right is irrelevant as only SNP MPs voted and no Parliament at Westminster can bind its successors under our unwritten constitution.”
England doesn’t have a written constitution but Scots have in the Declaration of Arbroath and Claim of Right. Both state that ONLY the people of Scotland are SOVEREIGN. The vote in Westminster was uncontested, not voted against by anyone. It’s recognised by all that Scots are SOVEREIGN IN LAW.

“You of course exist on anti English hatred, most English do not exist on anti Scottish hatred.” Absolute bollocks. The hatred is mainly from English towards Scots and Scotland. Your conceit and arrogance is on full show with that comment. I’m seeking DEMOCRACY. It’s nothing to do with English people but everything to do with the removal of Westminster’s colonial grip on my country.

You’re on full on anti English now. Not only do you claim that Scotland was extinguished, but provide no legal document as proof. You’re now saying England was extinguished in 1707 too. Good luck explaining that to your xenophobic, little Englander Brexitosser contingent.

HYUFD says:
22 August, 2018 at 1:09 pm
“Without Scotland England and Wales would still have 1 of the wealthiest cities in the world in London and still be in the top 10 largest global economies.”
But it would lose 60% of the territory it controls just now, lose it’s seat on the Security Council as the UK would cease to exist, lose the vast energy resources it uses to balance England’s £2 TRILLION debt, your currency will plummet without Scotland’s positive trade balance, you’d lose your credit rating, no longer be a nuclear power as the nukes are based in Scotland, technically they’d be ours and anyway you’ve nowhere to house them in England, you’d suffer brownouts or blackouts without our electricity. Basically without Scotland England is a basket case.
“Scotland would not even be in the G20.”
We don’t care. We would have democracy, be free of Tory regimes, free from their austerity dogma, set our own relations with the EU and wider world, prosper without subsidising England and without Westminster stealing our territory, wealth and resources.
Most of the most successful countries in the world are small countries with between 5 – 15 million people.

“Scotland has also had its own monarchs even before joining the UK” Stating the obvious but at least that’s accurate and true. Makes a change for you. Definite progress though obvious and meaningless.
“and Scots played a key part in the Empire.” Eh no. Scots played their part freeing others from the Empire, but those born here working for the Empire were BRITNATS not Scottish. That’s the thing about Scottish nationalism. It’s civic not blood and soil, as you English prefer.

Juan That was the sovereign legislative body in Scotland at the time and the people of Scotland already rejected independence in 2014. Germany, Spain, Italy, Belgium, the USA (Texas was a Republic), India through the Maharajah states etc are all made up of former independent countries like the UK is.

Given Doggerland coveted most of northern Europe that does not negate my point. The Declaration of Arbroath was made by Robert Bruce it was superseded by the Act of Union. Your false statement of colonialism proves your anti English sentiment, given Scots have full representation at Westminster and their own Parliament at Holyrood that is now Federalism not Colonialism. England I accept is a ceremonial country only like Scotland and Wales, the only sovereign country in GB is the UK

Scotland is less than 10% of the UK population and only a quarter of the land area. Without Scotland rUK would remain I the UN Security Council as a permanent mber as once in you cannot be removed, would remain the joint largest European military with France and would remain a G7 and G20 economy. Scotland would disappear from all those bodies and have a military about the size of Belgium’s.

The biggest contributor to the UK economy is financial services based in London and the likes of HSBC and Barclays, RBS had to be bailed out plus English focused pharmaceuticals like GlaxoSmithKline. The Scottish evonomy is based on oil which will eventually run out. England and Wales has hydroelectric power, nuclear power, solar power, plenty of gas and electricity stations etc. Scotland begged to join the Union last time it was independent after it went bust. Scots from Livingstone and beyond played a part in Empire building, indeed Scotland went bust trying to build its own Empirehttp://www.heraldscotland.com/news/12140796.History_of_Scottish_role_in_British_Empire/

Yesindyref2 As Westminster is sovereign technically s30 can be repealed although politically unlikely. 10% of SNP voters back the Union in polls we are talking the majority of party voters. Claim of Right as you affirmed not discussed in judgement by SC and any future Statute at Westminster would be Supreme and the Supreme Court ultimately must accept statute, it cannot change it. Norway is not in the EU and Denmark not in the Euro, not what the SNP had in mind for Scots

HYUFD @ 6.12
Aye HYUFD…. those Countries ye mention all re organised into the the Countries we know today.
But the bit yer missing is that they all formed their Constution to achieve it.
They defined their laws and borders….
The UK Parliament hasn’t done that…. Westminster has bumbled along with the 1707 .Treaty agreement (the clue is in the name “Treaty of Union “, no Constution)
And a Constution is what Westminster/the UK would need to replace the Treaty with if the UK is ever to become the Country you claim or wish it is…
But I’m tell ye now HYUFD they dare’nt try…
The amount of Constutional shit that attempting to do so would throw up…. all the public toilets in Leven getting opened could not cope with…
If Westminster could have easily locked Scotland in with a Constution that would have done it long since… Because they know that one affluent City disnay equal the resources of Scotland… never has and never will…
It’s a hard rain for British Nationals… but there it is, they/you will need tae come up wi something better then “we’ll London’s rich” to convince us the Treaty’s worth keeping…
Whit else ye got?

The UK is NOT a “country” – it is a union of two kingdoms. Before you start spouting your understanding of the status of Scotland, you should really fact-check, not depend on the propaganda you’re obviously absorbing, from wherever.

You also commented at 6:24 pm,

“Scotland is less than 10% of the UK population and only a quarter of the land area.”

Somebody has been gibberin’ braille at you and you have accepted it as truth. (sad shakey head…)

Scotland comprises the northern one third of the island of Great Britain as well as 790 surrounding islands encompassing the major archipelagoes of the Shetland Islands, Orkney Islands and the Inner and Outer Hebrides.
andMainland Scotland has 6,160 miles (9,910 km) of coastline. Including the numerous islands, this increases to some 10,250 miles (16,500 km).

As you can see, the area under Scotland’s jurisdiction, land and water, far exceeds England’s – even if you include Wales’ waters with England’s – but also has something like 90% of the UK’s oil and gas production.

So, we’re not “too wee” and, once we’ve unchained The Unicorn to give our independent government all the fiscal levers that independence brings, we won’t be “too poor”, not with 60% of the EU’s oil and gas production on top of all the rest of our resources, which we could sell to England, if you’re nice.

And, when you look at the success of Scots in all fields over the centuries, we’re certainly not “too stupid”.

yesindyref2 says:
22 August, 2018 at 3:53 pm
“Scotland would not even be in the G20”
Neither is Denmark or Norway. So what?
Aye, it’s no the size of yer country or economy, but the company ye keep n how happy ye are. Being a part, and a bit part at that, of somebodyelse’s country/ economy isn’t better than having democracy.

“FUD – Fear Uncertainty Doubt. And the other meaning.”
FUD= Federalist Unionist Devolutionist. Is that what you meant? Or the other one….

HYUFD @ 7.11
Again yer taking a statement and running wi it HYUFD
Yer absolutely correct the Supreme Court must rule according to Westminster statute and Westminster makes Sovereign Law for the UK
But… and it’s a big But….
The 1707 Treaty of Union is the foundation document OF the UK/Westminster Parliament..
It’s what gives Westminster decisions the Force of Law…
If there is no more Treaty… not only is there no more UK Parliament there is also no UK Supreme Court and no matter what arrangement Westminster made for England’s Parliament and it’s Courts none of those Courts decisions would carry the force of Law in Scotland…
Nae Treaty nae UK … it really is that simple…

Section 30 or anything else holds nae power here,only TWO bodies can end that Treaty The People of Scotland or the Queen of England representives of ANY one of those two will do to dissolve the Treaty.
A UK Parliament or UK Court has not a thing to say about it, they are instruments of the Treaty.
While one Parliament indeed canny bind another…. They, are all and have always been bound by the 1707 Treaty of Union.
That’s the bit they Don’t boast about… Parlimentry Sovereignty my aunt fanny…
Westminster and it’s Supreme Court must operate within the Treaty!!!

HYUFD says:
22 August, 2018 at 6:12 pm
“Juan That was the sovereign legislative body in Scotland at the time and the people of Scotland already rejected independence in 2014.”

The parliament was never Sovereign, it was the people and has been since 1320. ONLY the people were Sovereign. Scots law is based on that unlike English law. Your monarch was sovereign through the Devine right of Kings nonsense. Your parliament has borrowed your monarchs sovereignty. There’s no sovereignty of of the people in England. You couldn’t even do a revolution right. Should’ve done what the French did. At least they’re actual citizens.

“Germany, Spain, Italy, Belgium, the USA (Texas was a Republic), India through the Maharajah states etc are all made up of former independent countries like the UK is.”

Aye many of those are made up modern countries, though many of them are in danger of reverting back to their original constituent parts. The UK though has never been a country. It’s a bloody Union. Even says so in it’s name! Name me another country that’s made up of countries.

It doesn’t matter how many times you repeat your lies. They’re all still lies. Just like your claim that only 8 type 26 frigates were promised, when it was 13 and still only 3 are on order. That’s less than 25% of those promised, but remarkably better than most of the BRITNAT colonialists promises.

Liz G No they did not, they just absorbed those countries into a whole l, the original countries still have the same boundaries. As no Parliament can binds its successors it is impossible to have a written constitution in the UK anyway. However that also means what Westminster says ultimately goes constitutionally. Scotland will have to broaden its economy beyond reliance on finite oil

HUUFD @ 9.28
Westminster is bound by the Treaty of the Union and you haven’t demonstrated that it’s not, you have just repeated the one Parliament can’t bind another.. a fact that is not in dispute.
What I asserted was that ALL Parliaments are bound by the Treaty that founded it!
The Supreme Court is not above the Parliament and the Parliament is not above the Treaty.
Westminster can change any laws … but it cannot alter that Treaty..

Stop diverting to oil, or I’ll think ye a coward who cannot hold a position.

The UK doesn’t have a written Constution because of the “ one Parliament can’t bind another rule” but rather because just like the Treaty of Union, it wouldn’t be any Parliament binding it’s successors it would be the Constution that checks it… and fine well ye know it…
The UK wouldn’t write a Constution because it would mean setting aside the Treaty and having to negotiate with Scotland the Constutional framework..
As for the Countries you spoke of… no they didn’t they are where they are because they settled on a Constution…
Think About it… if what you claim was true… the EU would now be one Country and it obviously most certainly is not…
In fact ye can leave that Union without any threat or interference AKA civilised..
Not like this cursed with dishonesty one Scotland’s in..

Liz G The Treaty of Union dissolved the then legislature of Scotland acting on behalf of the Scottish people into the Westminster Parliament which has supreme sovereignty over the whole UK, it’s executive as you say acting on behalf of the monarch

Juan The people elected the Parliament which absorbed itself into Westminster and the people rejected Scottish independence in 2014. In France the people are only sovereign through electing the President and National Assembly. The UK is a sovereign country, its home nations are just ceremonial countries no different really to the other former countries mentioned.

Brian Doonethan About as pointless a point as talking about the Texan or Bavrian health care state. Though at least you have acknowledged Scotland already effectively manages the Scottish NHS anyway via Holyrood

It was the the then Scottish Parliament that signed the Treaty and transferred its then powers to Westminster making Westminster sovereign. Westminster has never had a written constitution as any future Parliament could repeal it. Scotland had an independence vote and voted No, the UK had a vote to leave the EU and voted Yes. Same with Canada and Quebec but not Spain and Catalonia

HYUFD @ 10.26
Are you actually claiming the Treaty of the Union says that?
Because it so doesn’t!!
You haven’t read it have you!
Nevertheless it is a,,,, TREATY,,, that is between Scotland and England,I think you’ve finally got it..yay well done you.
That’s what we were discussing… A Treaty does not a Country make.
A Treaty is an agreement between Countries or in this case Kingdom’s.
It’s a Constitution that defines Countries.

As to your assertion of the dissolution of Holyrood
The current Monarch stood and bore witness tae the Parliament of Scotland being reconvined,go correct her,if ye think yer right about that!
I’d wager she’ll not thank ye for it..
But it matters not as no People’s could rightly be held in a Treaty against their will.
Treaties end when they no longer are of use to the people bound by them.
Oh and just as a FYI Westminster doesn’t claim to have “Supreme” Sovereignty … Just Sovereignty!

HYUFD says:
22 August, 2018 at 9:28 pm
“Liz G No they did not, they just absorbed those countries into a whole l,” Where does it say that Scotland or even England were extinguished in the Treaty of Union? Got a link to prove YOUR LIE/ OPINION? “the original countries still have the same boundaries.” This is another of your LIES. Scotland has been PHYSICALLY reduced and diminished by being a COLONY of England, not the “Equal Partner in a Union” we legally are. In 1999 Tony Blair (War Criminal) STOLE SIX THOUSAND SQUARE MILES OF SCOTLAND’S TERRITORY FOR ENGLAND and the compliant, colonialist propaganda outlets remained silent (except for The Herald). This STOLEN SIX THOUSAND SQUARE MILES contained numerous oil and gas fields. Wars have been started for less. This boundary change is ILLEGAL under international law and will be repatriated to Scotland on our independence.
Here’s a wee link:http://www.oilofscotland.org/scotlands_stolen_sea.html
As you struggle with reading here’s a wee video link:https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QWn8CaCCuhE

“As no Parliament can binds its successors it is impossible to have a written constitution in the UK anyway.”
No a written constitution could be introduced if a Party has it in it’s manifesto, as well as ridding this corrupt “democracy” of it’s unelected second chamber, which is bigger than the elected chamber. How messed up is that in a so called democracy?

“However that also means what Westminster says ultimately goes constitutionally.”
You’d love that to be the case, but it’s not. Westminster would lose a constitutional battle in the International Court of Justice and they know it, which is why they’ll do anything to avoid this happening. Westminster isn’t legally sovereign in Scotland, because Scots law is “sacrosanct in perpetuity” according to the Treaty of Union which is the only legally binding Treaty that holds the UK together.

It’s not just Physically that Scotland is diminished by being ruled by England but Politically, Environmentally, Economically, Socially and Culturally. I’ve already proven the Physically part and will happily prove the others.

“Scotland will have to broaden its economy beyond reliance on finite oil”
Scotland will never prosper while ruled by England. Even when Glesga was the workshop of the world, poverty was rife and life expectancy lower than in England.

Colonies have they’re assets stripped and territory removed, not equal partners in a Union. Do you think this was a gift from Scotland to England? Politicians didn’t have this in their manifesto. It’s not theirs to give. It’s not even Queenies to give. No monarch has been sovereign in Scotland since 1320.

Why wasn’t this massive transfer of territory of our (Scots) generosity broadcast across the BRITNAT colonialist media if that same media are not propaganda tools of Westminster?

Don’t give us your faux and condescending bullshit. Scotland has been subsidising England for every minute, of every hour, of every day, of every month and year of the 311 years of this BLOODY “Union”.

Did I mention the genocide of Scots? In 1706 Scots made up between 20-25% of the total population of the UK. Now it’s only 8.4%. Struggling to see this as a benefit of English OCCUPATION.

HYUFD @ 10.40
No,the then Scottish Parliament didn’t transfer it’s powers to Westminster
The Scottish Parliament joined Westminster
Again the clue is in the name… UK Parliament
Scottish MPs from Holyrood went there to do business under the Treaty terms
There are still there…And that’s because we still have a Treaty…
You do realise that the English Parliament signed the Treaty too?
That should tell you that this Treaty was about running both Kingdoms from the one Parliament.
Otherwise who did the English Parliament sign their powers too ?
Both the powers of Scotland and England are dispensed from the joint Parliament
Scotland’s powers didn’t just disappear!
And future Parliaments can’t change a Constution… that’s the whole point of Constutions …that’s why Westminster doesn’t want one…
But mair tae the point the Sovereign “Supreme or no” Westminster can’t cannot no siree change the Treaty of Union….. EVER… only WE or Auld Lizzie Windsor instruct that.
Auld supreemy soverny Westminister disnay have the power..
Oh it can change Acts of Union till the coos come home but not the Treaty..

LizG It was a Treaty that brought together England and Scotland under one supreme Parliament as they were already under 1 monarch. A constitution does not define a country, that comes from its culture, language, legislature, Head of State, sporting teams, food, armed forces, currency too. A constitution is just one part. Technically the old Scottish Parliament is still part of Westminster

Juan Scotland is just a ceremonial country now as England is but with its own Parliament at Holyrood and representatives at what is now effectively a Federal Parliament at Westminster. A written constitution could be repealed by a new government elected on a manifesto commitment to do so. Even the ICJ cannot bind Westminster as Westminster could pass a Statute refusing to recognise it

Scotland has its common law but England does not rule it as most domestic policy in Scotland is decided at Holyrood and Westminster contains representatives of all 4 home nations not just England. The Scottish people of course endorsed the Union by a big 10% margin in 2014 anyway so even if sovereignty rests with them that supports the Union too. The North Sea is not part of UK landmass

You could make an argument Scotland has been subsidising Wales and Northern England as it is richer than them but London and the South East are much richer than Scotland and have been subsidising Scots as much as the rest of the UK. Sone Scots have emigrated to the US, Canada and Australia, that is no genocide and a contemptible point

Liz The Act of Union absorbed the English and Welsh Parliament and the Scottish Parliament into one UK Westminster Parliament. Under Westminster sovereignty no Parliament can bind a future Parliament even if it tried to with a written constitution as a future one could repeal it. Of course the Scottish people endorsed the Union anyway by 55% to 45% in 2014 and the Queen remains Queen of the UK

HYUFD @ 12.38
The Treaty defined the “rules of engagement” when both sets of politicians worked out of the same building .
A Constitution absolutely defines a Country … Its called “The Preamble” its the statement at the very start..( The best known one is the American one.. We the People hold these truths to be self evident that all men are created equal the right to life ,liberty and the pursuit of Happiness, ect,ect!!)… all the rules FOR the Government follow on from that.
As for 1 monarch…well…yes but ye forget there’s 2 Crowns.
That they are per chance on the one head didn’t affect Scotland and England for well over 100 year’s,is evidence that the Parliamentary Union (the one that ,needed, a Treaty)has no effect on the Union of the Crowns..
Don’t go being like the Orange Order and get caught up arguing for the wrong Union… They are going to be so embarrassed when they work that one out!

“Holyrood is just a subsidiary of Westminster created by Westminster statute” but at it’s opening was reconvened and it’s elected by SOVEREIGN Scots.

“Scotland is just a ceremonial country now as England is but with its own Parliament at Holyrood and representatives at what is now effectively a Federal Parliament at Westminster.”
A “ceremonial country”. I’ve never heard of one of them before. Have you got a link to some legal authority that has passed this judgement on Scotland?
“Even the ICJ cannot bind Westminster as Westminster could pass a Statute refusing to recognise it” it’s the international or World Court. Failure to comply would make England a renegade state and international pariah. Not that that would bother a Democracy denier and colonialist like yourself. Not a good move for a country seeking new trade deals.

“Scotland has its common law”
It’s the ACTUAL legal law. England has no legal right to overrule it. This would be a legal breech of the Treaty of Union leading to it’s dissolution. Think about it.

“Westminster contains representatives of all 4 home nations not just England.”
But again not EQUAL. Only 59 MP’s from Scotland against 533 from England. There can never be a Federal UK because of the imbalance of populations nd parliamentary representation. The Treaty would need to be renegotiated by the ENGLISH and Scottish parliaments. England doesn’t have one.

“The Scottish people of course endorsed the Union by a big 10% margin in 2014” that was then we’ve already highlighted some of the LIES that bought that result. Democracy is a process not an event! Otherwise why not just have one election every 20 years?

“The North Sea is not part of UK landmass”
Well spotted Sherlock. Nobody said it was part of the landmass. You said Scotland made up 20% of the landmass which is ANOTHER LIE. It’s 30% of the land and 60% of TOTAL UK TERRITORY.

“You could make an argument Scotland has been subsidising Wales and Northern England as it is richer than them but London and the South East are much richer than Scotland and have been subsidising Scots as much as the rest of the UK.”
You could try to make that argument but Scotland has NEVER been subsidised by England. That’s not the point of colonies. We’ve ALWAYS paid in more than we get back. We only receive a SMALL PORTION of OUR OWN MONEY returned to us.https://wingsoverscotland.com/the-historical-debt/
(It’s in the WoS reference section under the heading “The Historical Debt”. The last three columns of the 1900’s to 1921 chart is proof that even before oil, Scotland contributed more to the UK than we got back. The last three columns are the most important. Starting with Contribution to Imperial Services (Scotland’s money kept by England for England, colonies don’t cost money. They’re there to provide the Imperial masters with wealth). We are a COLONY not an equal partner and always have been treated as such. Notice the % Spent OUTWITH Scotland compared to Spent in Scotland. This was when Scotland (Glesga) was the workshop of the world, yet poverty was rife and during this period England put English soldiers with machine guns and tanks on the streets of Glesga.
The English have told EVERY Colony that they couldn’t survive without them and their trade, including America, India, Australia, Malta, South Africa …. So far only one colony has been stupid enough to believe them. No colony has ever returned to English imperial rule. Not one.

“Sone Scots have emigrated to the US, Canada and Australia, that is no genocide and a contemptible point”
Most weren’t going willingly. They were forced. Houses burned crops torched and marched into waiting ships. That’s not emigration that’s ETHNIC CLEANSING AND GENOCIDE.

HYUFD says:
23 August, 2018 at 12:56 am
“Liz The Act of Union absorbed the English and Welsh Parliament and the Scottish Parliament into one UK Westminster Parliament Under Westminster sovereignty”
No it didn’t. If it had then Scots law would’ve been extinguished and replaced by English law. It hasn’t and wasn’t because the two cannot ever be reconciled. The people of England are chattel, property of the Crown and Scots are LEGALLY SOVEREIGN. Where’s your link to the part of the Treaty of Union to prove your point?you cannot provide one because there is none. YOURE LYING, AGAIN.

“Of course the Scottish people endorsed the Union anyway by 55% to 45% in 2014”
And we have the DEMOCRATIC right to review and revisit that decision ANYTIME and as often as we want or is the UK not a democracy?

“and the Queen remains Queen of the UK” well you say that. She’s the Queen of England, I’ve seen the coronation on film, but I’ve never seen her Coronation as Queen of Scots. Got a link to a film of that?
(Touching the Scottish Crown with the tip of a gloves finger does not constitue a Coronation.

LizG Wrong, a constitution can define a new country e.g. Germany and the USA but plenty of countries throughput history have not had written constitutions and if there is not a written constitution when a country is founded it by definition does not define that country. Of course even the SBP wants to continue the monarchy so that is a different argument.

The only sovereign country in GB is the UK, it is the UK with the Supreme Parliament, Holyrood is just a subsidiary of it. Technically of course as the UK is a permanent member of the UN Security Council ICJ rulings do not absolutely bind it anyway, see also the US and China.

Scotland has its common law over criminal law and civil law and Justice is one of the core powers of Holyrood anyway so Westminster does not interfere in it. Scotland has MPs at Westminster proportionate to its own population AND its own Parliament at Holyrood that decides most Scottish domestic policy. 63% of Scots voted for Unionist parties in 2017 affirming the 2014 result.

Nobody lives in the North Sea and the North Sea does not all belong to Scotland.Through the Barnett formula Scotland still receives a subsidy from the rest of the UK. Scotland is not a colony, it was the Scottish Parliament which begged England to form a Union when Scotland went bust

Scotland is a constitutional monarchy just as England is, real legislative power lies at Westminster and Holyrood. In 2017 over 60% of Scots voted for Unionist parties when the SNP was pushing for an indyref2 after the Brexit vote. The Queen is a direct descendant of Mary Queen of Scots and she was crowned as Queen of England, Scotland, Wales and NI along with Queen of Canada, Australia and New Zealand

HYFUD
You’ve continued to just repeat the same OPINION that you hold but have NOTHING to back them up. No links to legal documents NOTHING!
What you’ve illustrated though is the complete contempt for Scots and Scotland that many people in England hold. You’ve clearly shown arrogance and delusions of theEnglish NATIONALISTS. You’re contempt for Scots our history, culture contempt for Basic Human rights, Democracy and the Rule of Law.
England is a rogue state. You’re Empire is over. It died last century and still you’ve not come to terms with it.
Reality will hit soon. They’ll be no denying it, but I’m sure you’ll try.
Keep howling at the moon.

Juan @ 9.59
Howling at the Moon…. Mair like wired tae the Moon.
But seriously Juan,I’ve heard very similar takes on our position and history before.
This is the kind of stuff that’s passed to low information voter’s of Orange persuasions.I
They then go on to think that they know,for sure how it all came about,and pass it on as fact…they never check.
Which does make ye wonder why such a person is attracted to a site known for fact checking,does it no?
Not tae worry we got some really good truths reposted last night…

I have no contempt for Scots the majority of whom voted for the Union my contempt is for anti English nats like you accusing my country of colonialism and genocide on No basis whatsoever and with contempt for the 2014 referendum vote. England never had an Empire as England has not been an independent country since the 14th century, the only Empire was a British Empire filled with Scottish generals and officers, Scottish merchants and Scottish civil servants administering that Empire. Nobody is demanding the restoration of the Empire just chippy Nats denying the fact it was Scotland’s failed Empire building in central America in the Darien Scheme which saw its Parliament ask to join England and Wales in the Union in which Scots were key players in Empire building

@Liz G. I’m from Glasgow (Glesga). Born in the eastend (Parkhead) and been living on the southside for most of my life. Nicola is my MSP. Theres a noisy contingent of uber BRITNATS and an Orange Hall in the area. Still it’s overwhelmingly SNP.

HYFUD is beyond most of the OO. During 2014 I’ve converted quite a few OO members. Even a third of them voted Aye, last time. They’re not impossible to turn. A third of them won’t vote Tory and 2/3rds count themselves as Scottish first and BritNat second. They’re the ones that you can explain the reality of the UK. Those in the OO who won’t vote Tory are fairly easy to turnaround. It’s pushing at an open door. The Scots/Brits are also open to persuasion but probably only really by other OO members that have seen the light. The last third are never going to change. They’re the dumbest of the dumb and all their self respect and self worth is wrapped up in being British, the empire ingrained bigotry and usually racist through and through. HYFUD is like the last lot. They’ve no thought or reason to their decisions. They’re brainwashed BRITNATS, nothing more. They cannot provide any evidence or proof or even rational thinking. They’re allergic to any rational thought.

It’s good, now and again to have a wee run through of their arguments, and expose how vacuous they really are. Provide info for those reading that they can use on anyone that voted No last time or thinking of voting No next time.

I’ll go back to reading not commenting for a wee while now. I’d rather concentrate on those that have a vote.

Juan @ 1.16
Aye Juan, I find their take on events and history fascinating,they don’t even see that their position is logically wrong.
But anyhoo keep on trying tae convince anybody you can they can support all the Crowns and Monachs they like… but they are being taken for mugs to be led from that into supporting Westminster…

HYUFD @ 12.53
Really HYFUD…. The Welsh Parliament has been in Westminster since the 16th century, how did it get there?
Are you saying that Westminster was a United Parliament before the Treaty?
Where was the Welsh Parliament sitting before the 16th century move to Westminster?
We have Holyrood & Westminster up and running in the 16th century, so where was the Welsh one?
Also what role did it play in the 1707 Treaty of the Union?
Who signed the 1707 Treaty for Wales?

Enquiring minds need to know?
Also do you feel damaged in anyway by yer history teacher?

There has not been a Welsh Parliament since Owain Glyndwr in the 1400s before Westminster formally became the English and Welsh Parliament in the 16th century Wales was governed by the Principality of Wales and the Marches Lords. Since the Laws of Wales Acts in the 1500s Wales has had MPs at Westminster who voted for the Act of Union.Indeed Wales only voted 51% to 49% in favour of the Welsh Assembly in 1997.

HYUFD @ 6.54
Despite our little sojourn back now tae the 14th century, of a Parliament “that didn’t “..
Can we stick to this, alleged,, Welsh Parliament in Westminster in the 16th century…

You said that the Westminster Parliament “Formally “ became the Parliament of England and Wales in the 16th century but had Welsh MPs in the 15th century ..?
So ………

They had MPs from a Parliament that didn’t exist for over a hundred years,turn up in Westminster for a century or so.
Westminster then made it Formal after said hundred years..
They seem settled for another hundred years….
at which point they became a Parliament again and was a third party to the Treaty of the Union…
Then they become just Welsh MPs again to vote on acts of the Union .
All of this is evidence that the 1707 Treaty of Union created a Country…..Really

But all those…. interesting…. claims tells me nothing about how the Parliament of Wales was involved in the 1707 Treaty of Union which is the assertion I actually asked about.
I don’t need the “History “ of this Welsh Parliament what you are being asked to demonstrate is the role you claim it had in the 1707 Treaty of Union…

Liz G Nope I said Wales had MPs at Westminster since the 1500s which was the 16th century. Welsh MPs were part of Westminster since the 16th century Laws of Wales Acts and thus voted for the Act of Union in 1707. Westminster was the Parliament of England AND Wales since the Laws of Wales Acts in 1536

Thepnr Yes I was a tiny minority on here in 2014 by being a Unionist on a Nationalist site but nonetheless I was on the same side as the 55% of Scots who voted to stay in the Union and won the referendum

HYUFD @ 1.22
No ye didn’t say that at all
Ye said that the Welsh PARLIAMENT was in the Westminster Parliament at the time of the Union with Scotland.
You said this after I told you the Scottish Parliament didn’t dissolve it’s self and go away but joined the English Parliament to form the United Kingdom Parliament…
If you are now changing yer position at least do so honestly.

HYFUD..@ 1.51
Now, you seem!! to have settled on Welsh MPs in the English parliament at the time of the Union..
How do ye know they voted for it??
I mean we are potentially talking about the ancestors of Labour here…which means theres a good chance they just abstaned?
Don’t ye think?

LizG The Welsh Parliament was Westminster, that was the only Parliament legislating over Wales just as Westminster was the Scottish Parliament, that was the only Parliament legislating over Scotland after the original Scottish Parliament voted to transfer its powers to Westminster. The Union with Scotland Act passed Westminster pretty comfortably though a few were concerned at the cost but if you want to believe Welsh MPs voted against Union with Scotland that is up to you. Westminster was the English AND Welsh Parliament

HYFUD @ 8.23
Ok, now we might be getting somewhere…
The Westminster Parliament was the only Parliament legislating over Wales….. Agreed.
But you haven’t said how that happened?

There’s no other Treaty of Union is there?
Otherwise the Westminster Parliament would already have been a United (?????) Something Parliament..
And I have made no claims about Welsh MPs of yore..only asked you questions? …….you will know when ye see (?)
Can ye name one of these Welsh MPs per chance?
So I could look at how he voted,and if he was actually Welsh?

Nobody is demanding the restoration of the Empire just chippy Nats denying the fact it was Scotland’s failed Empire building in central America in the Darien Scheme which saw its Parliament ask to join England and Wales in the Union in which Scots were key players in Empire building’

Quite the penchant for evidence free assertions haven’t ye?

You clearly have a very limited knowledge of the history of the Darien scheme to come out with that typically British Nationalist trope?

But ignorance is blissful for those who dismiss others’ viewpoints on the basis of such flimsy throw away denigrating assertions such as you have displayed throughout your exchanges with others on this thread.

You’re the chippy British ‘nat’ defending ‘your’ identity on here for no other reason than your stated contempt for those who disagree with your assertions? And being utterly derogatory in the process:

‘…my contempt is for anti English nats like you accusing my country of colonialism and genocide on No basis whatsoever…’

So here is some light reading on the Darien adventure, with a little more depth and context surrounding this so called ‘failure’ that preceded the Acts of Union. May I suggest you read more widely than the clearly limited fayre you’ve so far digested wrt Scotland’s political and constitutional history?

It’s customary to behave like a guest when visiting others on their home ground. Take note.

——————————————————————————————

‘The story of Darien is a tale of betrayal, power, and military and political might brought to bear against Scotland. Professor Chalmers is right in one regard however – it was indeed the Treaty of Union that gave us access to Commonwealth markets, and it was the Commonwealth (rather than the Union per se) that provided the opportunities for Scots. These opportunities were previously denied to Scotland, and amounted to far more than mere trade. Their opening swiftly led to the development of a large Scottish diaspora throughout the world, but most noticeably in Commonwealth countries and the United States.

Darien was a disaster, of that there can be no doubt, but it wasn’t the end result of any inherent flaw in the Scottish psyche, or an indicator of the inability to manage our own affairs. That’s just the position the BritNat mythology wants to portray.
So what IS the story of Darien? To find out, we first need to rewind a little further.
The relationship between Scotland and England in the 14th and 15th centuries was tempestuous at times, with one of the last major flare-ups arising in 1489 when Sir Andrew Wood was forced to clear the Scottish seas of English privateers, capturing five and bringing them as prizes into Leith. Aggrieved by this success, Henry VII of England fitted out three privateers in 1490 to exact vengeance, but after an extended battle ranging from the Forth to the Tay, Henry’s ships were all captured by Wood.

After that skirmish things remained relatively uneventful until the Union of the Crowns in 1603, with Scotland thereafter finding itself England’s ally and friend. Yet after the Union of the Crowns Scotland became progressively poorer, neglected by its King in London and dragged unwillingly into England’s wars.
In the 1620s, Scotland fought naval wars as England’s ally, first against Spain and then against France (despite the Auld Alliance), but refused to send conscripts to the Royal Navy, claiming that Scotland had no deep-water sailors. This was a bending of the truth on Scotland’s part, as several squadrons of Scottish warships (known as the “marque fleets”) put to sea, supported by individual privateers licensed with letters of marque and three sizeable ships of the Royal Scots Navy.

But Scotland didn’t want to send these resources away, as their intended role was defensive protection of the east coast trade routes, which led to them being mainly privately funded. Scotland’s naval priorities were the protection of national trade, and the pursuit of profitable raiding cruises against enemy cargos. They lacked the large, purpose-built warships of the Royal Navy, and didn’t share the English policy of building a heavily-armed royal fleet to project military power against foreign enemies.

Despite these efforts, Scotland quickly found itself drawn into the war, proving to be a very capable ally. The “marque fleets” replaced the Royal Navy as the patrol squadrons in the Irish Sea, and subsequently joined the private navy of the Lord Lieutenant of Nova Scotia in a force that for a short while made Scotland the dominant imperial power in Canada.

In 1632 Scotland lost Nova Scotia – her only colony – as a result of the English war against France. England’s Dutch wars subsequently compromised valuable trading privileges upon which Scottish merchants had previously relied. Scottish overseas trading activity was further hampered by the Navigation Act, which cut Scottish ships out of international trade by forbidding the import of goods into England or her colonies unless carried in English ships or ships from the goods’ country of origin.
Beginning in 1651, the goal of the Act was to force colonial development into lines favourable to England, and stop direct colonial trade with the Netherlands, France, Scotland and Spain. This law was enacted despite the Union of Crowns, and effectively meant that Scots merchants were boycotted for trade in England and all her colonies. To make matters worse two powerful English trading companies – the East India Company and the Royal African Company – claimed monopolies on the rich trades with the East Indies and Africa and jealously guarded these territories.
This situation gave rise to the reasoning behind the Darien Scheme – access to trade.

The architect of Darien was a man called William Paterson, who would the following year be instrumental in the foundation of the Bank of England. He devised a plan aimed at bringing financial prosperity to Scotland, proposing in 1693 that the Scottish Parliament should grant a Scottish monopoly on overseas trade to a trading company, enabling it to harness the lucrative and relatively available Far Eastern market in the same manner as the English had achieved with Africa and the Indies.
Key to the plan was the establishment of a Scottish colony in Central America, at a place called Darien (now part of Panama), so that goods could be transferred from the Pacific to the Atlantic without having to make the long and perilous journey around Cape Horn or the Cape of Good Hope. Instead, goods would be transported to the colony at Darien, on the Atlantic side of the Isthmus of Panama, and carried across to a port on the Pacific side, where ships with exchange cargoes from the East Indies and Asia would be waiting.

In 1695 the Bank Of Scotland was established and the Company Of Scotland was born, with its capital intended to be £600,000 raised by public subscription, of which half was to come from within Scotland and the rest from elsewhere. Investors in England, Amsterdam and Hamburg quickly raised their share, but the East India Company – fearing that their monopoly would be broken – used their influence on the king and English Parliament to persuade them to act against the venture.

The English government of King William III – anxious to be on good terms with Spain – didn’t need much persuading, as the proposed Scottish colony would be located on land the Spain had its own designs on. England was at war with France and hence didn’t want to offend the Spanish, who claimed the territory as part of New Granada. The East India Company threatened legal action on the grounds that the Scots had no authority from the king to raise funds outside the English realm, and obliged the promoters to refund subscriptions to the Hamburg investors, with English investors also quickly withdrawing their money.

This left no source of finance but Scotland itself, yet so fierce was the resentment at the duplicity of the king and English Parliament that Scots resolved to raise all the capital alone. Thousands of Scots put their own money into the enterprise alongside money from the nobles, and the Company raised just under £400,000 in a few weeks, with investments from every level of society and totalling roughly a fifth of the wealth of Scotland. This was an enormous sum for the time, amounting to about half the country’s available capital, despite it being a fully private venture.
Although the proposed location of the Company’s first colony was still a closely-guarded secret, preparations for the expedition were public and extensive. Ships, provisions and trading stock were bought in cities across Europe, crews were recruited and the expedition’s five ships assembled in the Firth of Forth.

The first fleet (Saint Andrew, Caledonia, Unicorn, Dolphin, and Endeavour) set sail from the east coast port of Leith so as to avoid observation by English warships, which they feared would capture or sink the traders. The plan was to make the journey around the north coast of Scotland, with the settlers below deck to hide the intent of the voyage. At a time when the total Scottish population amounted to only about one million, the amount of manpower committed to the venture was every bit as staggering as the financial commitment.

Even as they departed from Leith, the people on the expedition still didn’t know where they were going. It wasn’t until the ships had passed Madeira that the captains were allowed to open their sealed orders which revealed the ultimate destination. They were ‘to proceed to the Bay of Darien, and make the Isle called the Golden Island … some few leagues to the leeward of the mouth of the great River of Darien … and there make a settlement on the mainland’. The fleet made landfall off the coast of Darien on 2 November. The settlers christened their new home “New Caledonia”.

There they built Fort St Andrew and began to erect the huts of what they hoped would become their permanent town, New Edinburgh. They cleared land for farming, but successful agriculture proved difficult. The local indigenous people proved unwilling to buy the combs and other trinkets offered by the colonists, and no fleets of merchant ships arrived to use the trade route.

The lack of trade was not an accident, as the English colonies in the West Indies and North America had been forbidden to communicate with the Darien colonists or offer them any help or assistance, by order of William and his government in London. By the onset of summer the following year, the climate, disease and hunger had led to a large number of deaths in the colony. The settlement had intended that many of the settlers would be dispersed across the continent ferrying goods from coast to coast, not all holed up in one place. The confined living conditions combined with poor hygiene and little food led to an epidemic of dysentery. Eventually the mortality rate rose to ten settlers a day.

After eight months the colony was abandoned and the settlers began the journey back to Scotland. One ship, desperate for aid, arrived at the Jamaican city of Port Royal but was refused assistance in response to the king’s standing orders not to help the settlers. Dejected and betrayed by their own monarch, the settlers continued onwards with only 300 of the original 1,200 settlers returning on a single ship to Scotland. Those who managed to survive the journey and returned home found themselves regarded as a disgrace to their country, and even disowned by their families.

Back in Scotland, however, nobody knew that the colony had collapsed, and a second expedition with a further 1,300 settlers on board had set sail. The second expedition arrived at Darien to find the huts of New Edinburgh in disrepair and the jungle reclaiming the land, forcing the new settlers to rebuild the settlement. The persistence of the Scots prompted the Spanish to take measures to prevent the Scots from securing the land, despite the fact that the Spanish were not interested in settling the area themselves. Ships carrying supplies to the settlers failed to arrive and the ship carrying the settler’s food supply mysteriously caught fire and burned to ashes.

Hearing of Spanish intentions to complete the job with a direct attack, the exhausted and hungry Scots launched a pre-emptive strike on the Spanish fort. In retaliation the Spanish blockaded Fort St Andrew, with the Scots settlers bravely holding out for more than a month before eventually surrendering. Decimated by disease and hunger and defeated by the Spanish, the colonists left Darien for the last time in April 1700.

The failure of the scheme provoked tremendous discontent throughout lowland Scotland, where almost every family had been affected. Many held the English responsible, while believing that they could and should assist in yet another effort at making the scheme work. The company petitioned the king to affirm their right to the colony, but he declined, replying that although he was sorry the company had incurred such huge loses, to claim Darien would mean war with Spain. A prolonged, futile debate on the issue served to further increase bitterness.

After the failure of the Darien colony the Company of Scotland struggled on, attempting to establish trading links in Africa and the Far East. However, the capture of one of the company’s ships, the Annandale, at the instigation of the East India Company in 1704 led to an outbreak of Scottish anger towards England. Later that year the English ship Worcester was captured in a reprisal raid and its crew accused of being the pirates who had sunk another company ship, the Speedy Return, in 1703.

Although many in Scotland were delighted it soon became clear to the directors of the Darien Company that the charges were not supported by any solid proof, and it seemed that the men would be released. However, claims surfaced from the crew of the Worcester that the Captain had drunkenly boasted of taking the Speedy Return, killing the crew and burning the ship. The men were convicted and sentenced to death.

Queen Anne – who had succeeded William in 1702 – advised her 30 Privy Councillors in Edinburgh that the men should be pardoned, but the public demanded that the sentence be carried out. Nineteen of the Councillors made excuses to stay away from the deliberations on a reprieve, fearing the huge mob that had arrived in Edinburgh to demand that the sailors be put to death. The crew, who were clearly innocent, were duly hanged. Popular ballads of the time indicate that this was seen as direct revenge for the role of England in the failure of the Darien scheme.

For both William and Anne, the lessons of the Darien affair were clear. They were anxious to avoid war with Scotland, which was becoming increasingly likely, as this would result in the loss of their lands and associated rents. They also wanted to prevent the Scottish Parliament from granting conflicting trade privileges and interfering in England’s foreign policy by acting as a competitor. The result was the plan to undertake a union of the Scottish and English Parliaments.

And so the negotiations with the Scottish nobles began. With power concentrated in the hands of only a few men, the deal was far easier to swing, and a crucial part of the proposed Treaty was Article 14 – a direct bribe to the nobles. It granted £398,085 and 10s to Scotland, to offset future liability towards the English national debt. Scotland, it should be noted, had no national debt of its own at the time – the Darien Scheme having been entirely privately funded.

The payment of £398,000 (known as ‘the Equivalent’) was to be used to support Scottish industries and as compensation for Darien investors, but it ended up doing only one of those jobs – the latter. Some of the money was also used to hire spies, such as the author Daniel Defoe, whose first reports were of vivid descriptions of violent demonstrations against the Union.

“A Scots rabble is the worst of its kind… for every Scot in favour there is 99 against”
Sir George Lockhart, the only member of the Scottish negotiating team who opposed the Union, noted that “The whole nation appears against the Union” and Sir John Clerk, an ardent pro-unionist and Union negotiator, observed that the treaty was “contrary to the inclinations of at least three-fourths of the Kingdom”. Public opinion against the Treaty as it passed through the Scottish Parliament was voiced through petitions from shires, burghs, presbyteries and parishes. The Convention of Royal Burghs also petitioned against the Union and not one petition in favour of an incorporating union was received by Parliament.

On the day the treaty was signed, St Giles Cathedral rang its bells in the tune ‘Why should I be so sad on my wedding day?’ As the nobles signed the Act of Union of 1707 the Scots people rioted in the cities. The Act was signed in secrecy so as to avoid the mob baying for blood in the streets.

These were the events which Robert Burns would decades later bitterly sum up in the famous and oft-quoted lines “We’re bought and sold for English gold, sic a parcel of rogues in a nation”. Defoe would go on to document many more objections:
“Seeing, by the articles of Union, now under the consideration of the Honourable Estates of Parliament, it is agreed that Scotland and England shall be united into one kingdom; and that the united kingdoms be united by one and the same Parliament, by which our monarchy Is suppressed, our parliament extinguished, and in consequence our religion, church government, claim of right, laws, liberties, trade and all that is dear to us, daily in danger of being encroached upon, altered or wholly subverted by the English In a British Parliament, wherein the mean representation allowed for Scotland can never signify in securing to us the interest reserved by us, or granted to us by the English.”

The Treaty was nevertheless enshrined in law and ‘the Equivalent’ was released. The men appointed to distribute the compensation money were known as Commissioners of the Equivalent, and they set up in The Company of Scotland’s old offices in Milne Square, Edinburgh. Only part of the Equivalent had been paid in cash; the rest was issued to creditors in the form of debentures. Two societies of debenture-holders were formed – one in Edinburgh and one in London.
(Even more direct bribery was also said to be a factor, with a further £20,000 dispatched for distribution by the Earl of Glasgow with James Douglas, 2nd Duke of Queensberry, the Queen’s Commissioner in Parliament, receiving £12,325.)
In 1724 the two societies united to create the Equivalent Company. Three years later this company sought a royal charter to allow it to offer banking services outside its own membership. When the charter was granted, the new bank it created was called The Royal Bank of Scotland.

And so Darien brought about the Union, and the rest is history? But how does all of this play into the BritNat mythology we discussed back at the beginning? Well, ask yourself this: having read the events surrounding Darien, the subsequent neglect of Scotland by its own king and the malicious manoeuvrings of the English Government, would you consider the Union as an act of rescue from England towards Scotland?
It is, I’d venture, more akin to having your neighbour beat you with a baseball bat in order to gain access to your home, only to chastise you and claim you should be grateful for the first-aid they administered after they’d got your keys.

To describe the Union, as Professor Chalmers did this week, as a benefit that had “convinced the business classes that they needed the military protection of the Royal Navy if they were to benefit from the new riches that colonialism promised” is to stretch the truth to breaking point. In reality Scotland’s nobles were bullied and bribed into signing the treaty by their more powerful neighbour, and when they none-too-reluctantly acquiesced it wasn’t for the benefit of the people of Scotland.
Scotland was not bankrupt and could have continued on as an independent nation. But being in the Union benefited Scotland by removing the impact of the Navigation Acts (allowing the Scots to trade with the colonies) and removing the threat of English privateers commandeering or destroying Scottish shipping. Access to trade – the same goal pursued by the Darien Scheme – was what brought Scotland into union with England, not some mythological pride in “Britishness”.

The relevance of this knowledge today is not as a symbol of some fundamental national ineptitude or – as the Economist would have us believe – the inherent perils of independence. Rather, it’s a reminder that it was the simple mundane realities of trade, and trade alone, which originally bound us to the Union.

In today’s globalised free-market world, however, there are no English privateers roaming the North Sea, and we no longer require the permission of the monarchy to conduct international business. So why do we still need to be in the Union? And perhaps more to the point, what is it that The Economist is so scared of?
The failures of a private venture over 312 years ago have no bearing on the future prosperity of Scotland, however many time the Unionists drag them up. We are not bound by the mistakes of the past – we can learn, improve and adapt, as all nations must. Darien is not a jmonument to failure, but a testament to the ambition and drive that the Scots people can muster against overwhelming odds and adversity. This time, though, the odds are not so stacked against us.’

There was no ‘English and Welsh’ Parliament There was and is no ‘Union’ that Scotland ‘asked to join’?

The Treaties of Union are formed by Scotland ‘and’ England alone. Wales was and still is ‘legallly’ a protectorate of England:

protectorate in British
(pr??t?kt?r?t )
noun
1.
a.
a territory largely controlled by but not annexed to a stronger state
b.
the relation of a protecting state to its protected territory
2.
the office or period of office of a protector

Your assertions are unfounded and baseless. Scotland is the equal partner of England alone.

Westminster has illegally set itself up as the English Parliament devolving limited ‘powers’ to its Treaty partner and granting an assembly to Wales and NI. Altering the constitution does not supersede the Treaty of Union. The Union is no longer fit for purpose, the ideological divergence driven by England’s right wing Tory dominance caused by a nation brainwashed by their own media screaming ‘immmigration bad’ has merely strengthened our arguments for independence.

I’d love if people like you dared to call an American, French or any other country on the planet a ‘nat’ just because they support and love where they are from?

There is absolutely nothing inherently ‘bad’ in our wanting the future we choose rather than our neighbours repeatedly deciding for us.

UKexit is the biggest current case in point in this regard.

Think what you like but don’t lecture us on here, we’ve had enough of being told by Westminster without evidence free assertions from those who support that corrupt supreme regime rationalising for them in the usual obsequious manner.

Liz G Westminster was the Parliament for Wales and England for 2 hundred years before the Act of Union, by definition once Westminster approved the Act of Union so did Wales. Indeed Wales almost rejected even accepting the offer of its own Assembly when 49% voted No to a Welsh Assembly in 1997

K1 I notice in your introduction no mention of Flodden when Henry VIII had to defeat a Scottish invasion by King James IV of Scotland in alliance with France.

If the Scots failed in their own Empire building venture in Panama so be it, as you point out it was the Spanish who ultimately defeated the Scots and their attempt to start a new settlement there. As a result of the Union Westminster then bailed out Scottish investors in the failed Darien Scheme (and do not think support for the Union was universal on the English side either at the time given the wealth of its overseas possessions and the fact that at the time Scotland was ‘a poor country with few roads, very little industry and almost no Navy.’ Scots as you say wanted the Union for trade and enhancing their own Empire building and colonising prospects.
Today the British Empire is long gone but the vast majority of Scottish exports go to England

K1 Wales was united formally with England under the Laws of Wales Acts and has had MPs at Westminster ever since. Wales also has its own Assembly even though 49% of Welsh voters voted against it in 1997 and it was almost rejected.

Westminster is not an English Parliament and has not been so since the 16th century. Westminster has English, Welsh, Scottish and NI MPs. You wrongly deny the facts. Nats like you will refuse to accept the will of the Scottish majority, the 55% of Scots who voted for the Union in 2014 and the 63% of Scots who voted for Unionist Parties in 2017 (after the Brexit vote) know better.

I am sure plenty of Canadians have some choice words to say about the Quebec separatists and similarly Spaniards to Catalan separatists. It is your party which has decided to call itself the Scottish NATIONAL Party

The Act of Union might have been between the Kingdoms of England and Scotland but Wales at that time was defined as within the Kingdom of England and the Westminster Parliament which voted for the Union contained Welsh MPs

It named itself the National party over 70 years ago, to underscore what would be required for Scotland to break from the Union…we would have to send down a majority of independence supporting MP’s? This was to distinguish those who supported ‘home rule’ from those who wanted independence? It’s not complicated…it’s also factual history.

We did that in 2015…how’d that work out?

It’s not ‘my party’, it’s the party who are in government in Scotland as voted by the Scots who live here. Ye haven’t figured out that no voters also vote for the SNP yet, have ye? It’s the 3rd biggest party by membership (though we suspect it’s now higher than Labour) in the UK. It’s ordinary people voting for the policies that the SNP put forward in their manifesto?

Really way to go wi the sneering of an entire country’s choices. It’s got nothing to do with who voted what way in 2014, don’t you actually realise that? Do some reading and understand what you are actually commenting on before typing in your ignorant sneering comments.

You literally are now making an absolute fool of yourself by revealing more and more about your true intent. An ugly little Englander putting the boot in over the name of a political party…a smear no less.

It’s as if you just cherry pick the bits that suit your own biases without any broad context taken into account.

And you don’t ‘get’ the ‘arrogance’ that sits at the heart of the ‘bigger polity’ shitting all over the ‘smaller polity’, no you characterise it as if we were some backward nation in need of rescue from dear old Blighty.

You are an English Nationalist…but of course you ‘don’t call yourself that’….as you would then have to consider the derogatory connotation that you are placing on calling us ‘nats’ in that condescending arrogant fashion we of course have spent hundreds of years dealing with.

K1 Scots voted 55% for the Union in 2015, they voted 50% ie half but still not 51% in 2016 to ensure more devolution that was delivered in the 2016 Scottish Act. They then voted 63% for Unionist Parties in 2017 when the SNP again tried to push indyref2. You then have the audacity to accuse me of sneering at a countries votes when you have refused completely to accept Scots verdict in 2014. I am a Unionist not an English nationalist, a Union of England, Scotland, Wales and NI the nationalists are the SNP

This is again another of your evidence free assertions. As I intimated above in previous comments, there is nothing ‘inherently bad’ about supporting independence for Scotland.

The manner in which ‘you’ are characterising those of us that support this proposition is nothing less than derogatory and downright sneering arrogance as is evidenced in all your ‘retorts’ to all of us who have indulged your nonsense on this thread.

There is no one ‘unionist’ party in Scotland that can ever become the Scottish government, they separately do not have the numbers to achieve this? The SNP as much as you are attempting to belittle the enormity of support across Scotland is the largest party supported by the ‘majority’ of the Scottish polity.

To ‘break’ our AMS system of voting whereby one party reaches that 50% is a near impossible feat? The very fact that the SNP broke that in 2011 is the reason that the unionist parties, especially Labour are furious, because until then Labour more or less ‘ran Scotland’ for decades.

Note:

‘The election delivered the first majority government since the opening of Holyrood, a remarkable feat as the Additional Member System used to elect MSPs was originally implemented to prevent any party achieving an overall parliamentary majority’

This is how our parliament works here. It had never been achieved because we have a proportional representation voting system. The SNP ‘broke’ the AMS system, it would be almost impossible for them to achieve that in consecutive terms of office and yet they are still the majority ruling government as elected by Scotland.

Our Local elections have a completely different proportional representation system too. STV, the singly transferable vote. It’s impossible for any ‘one party’ to achieve these nonsense 50% ‘markers’ that you are citing as some how prove that the SNP are somehow on the wain and that you think by adding the percents together it proves that you are correct?

It doesn’t, it proves that you have a profound lack of understanding about how our electoral system functions and zero appreciating of the dark money campaign where bigots form Orange lodges and dodgy geezers got into our councils during all those elections. A relentless negative targeted campaign by the Tories in all three different elections which focused on ‘indyref’ from them. Labour and Tory party activists (and the leader of Labour in Scotland at that time, Kezia Dugdale) ‘tactically’ worked together to achieve these results. Labour were the true losers not the SNP?

AND THE SNP STILL WON THEM ALL.

There was no ‘push for indyref’ at any of these elections from the SNP?

There was the SNP’s manifesto…the SNP has the largest contingent of councillors and MSP’s and MP’s in Scotland, no matter how the ‘narrative’ that the msm, which is clearly where you are getting your information from, ‘spin’ it. It doesn’t change the reality of ‘how’ those gains were made by the unionist parties in all those elections.

No amount of jiggery pokery wi percentages of ‘if all the others are added together it cancels out the SNP vote’ alters this fact?

The very fact that your are utilising this type of rhetoric show a mind unhinged and incapable of understanding what the fuck he is talking about. You clearly do not live in this country and yet you feel fine about coming on to the number one independence blog in the UK and lecturing those of us who live and world here about ‘history’, and how ‘the SNP have ‘National’ in their party name and that makes them…what?

Your are a sneering piece of work wi the intelligence and depth of a typical tourist mentality that skims the surface of a place and decides they’re ‘an expat’ and you look down from your great arrogant and more saliently ‘ignorant’ perch showing off how you really don’t understand anything that you are spouting about in that place.

Of course there’s nowt up wi your lot is there….your supreme Tory rulers…you’ve a fucking check coming on here disparaging us for wanting a better life than the one you’ve happily succumbed to under the thumb of that lot.

Come back when you’ve matured enough to debate us on equal terms. And with facts and evidence to support your ‘percents added together means ‘we win’ yay’ schtick and more importantly go and do some reading and educate yersel…it’s getting tiring schooling such a dimwit about the nature and polity of the country that he knows nothing about.

HYUFD @ 9. .57
They might well have voted for Acts of Union..
But the conversation only ends when we reach a consensus on.. The Treaty of Union ..
Come on now..
Talk Treaty!!
Read it!
Know it
Acknowledge it…
I dare ye…tae defiy it!!

K1 Scotland remains a country that voted 55% for the Union in the referendum called after the SNP majority in 2011 and 63% for Unionist parties in 2017 when the SNP pushed indyref2 afyer the Brexit vote.
The country I was born into was the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, not England, the same country as most Scots as they affirmed in 2014

HYFUD @ 2.54pm
We’ve been over this HYFUD
A Treaty does not a Country make..
You were born into a Kingdom United with another Kingdom in a TREATY agreement.
Why do you deny the circumstances of yer birth?

Och away ye go…talking absolute nonsense. You were born in England, just as those born in France are French and those born is Scotland are Scottish…you are English. There is no such ‘nationality’ as a ‘United Kindgomer’

What complete idiocy you afford your own mind does not extend to the mind’s of those you are choosing to patronise with this…stretching the rules of decent exchange to the limits with this sort of twisted and quite frankly utterly absurd ‘spin’.

LizG England is not a sovereign country, it does not have a place at the UN and it is not represented in the Olympics and it does not have its own currency or its own Passport or even lime Scotland its own Parliament. The only sovereign country on my passport and with a place at the UN and with its own currency and represented at the Olympics is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

LizG England is not a sovereign country, it does not have a place at the UN and it is not represented in the Olympics and it does not have its own currency or its own Passport or even like Scotland its own Parliament. The only sovereign country on my passport and with a place at the UN and with its own currency and represented at the Olympics is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

‘…my contempt is for anti English nats like you accusing my country of colonialism and genocide on No basis whatsoever…’

(Please do tell us all the name of the ‘my country’ you are referring to?)

To this:

25th August 2.54pm

‘The country I was born into was the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, not England,…’

(Please do tells us what country your are referring to as ‘the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland’?)

In just over 48 hours.

——————————————-

You went from whingingengnat ‘my country is being maligned’, (which it wasn’t by the way, you are the one who had insisted this is about ‘anti English’, because that’s all you’ve read and you can’t do ‘nuance’) to ‘who me?’ I’m above ‘nationalities’ as you were repeatedly informed about the constitutional set up of your own and this country.

The Treaty of Union is a contract between the two Kingdoms of Scotland and England respectively, it literally states this as fact with the legal term now used to define our ‘state’ the United Kingdom…..’and’…NI

I’ll reiterate briefly, for you clearly have a real problem understanding the term ‘debate’:

You can’t compare the ‘constitutional’ arrangement of either Canada or Spain with that of Scotland and England?

These are ‘province/autonomous community’ of those Countries’ They are not in a Union with Canada or Spain.

Scotland is not a ‘region’ of England, nor is it in any kind of ‘federal set up’, there is no such ‘country’ as the UK&NI? There is a ‘state’ formed by the Union of Scotland and England & NI?

You’re the one desperately trying not to call yourself ‘English’ after taking ‘offence’ at ‘my country’ being accused of ‘things I don’t agree with’? Only to finish with: ‘The country I was born into was the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, not England,…’

You were born in England.

Catalans were born in Catalonia which is an autonomous ‘community’ in Spain, it is not a country in Spain. Quebec is a province in Canada, not a country in Canada.

What point do you actually think you are making. Your the one wi the ‘confused’ identity.

You typed,“The country I was born into was the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, not England, the same country as most Scots as they affirmed in 2014”

Y’ken, HYUFD, your whole manner of posting here reminds me of “sensibledave” – politeness, along with ignorance, gleaned from whatever section of the MSM he was spt to read over his corn flakes.

Sigh…
The UK is not a “COUNTRY”, as others have pointed out to you. It is a UNION of two kingdoms. Now, I realise that you have probably got your info from the UK establishment press but you must realise that the UK MSM is the most distrusted in Europe?

“UK newspapers appear to be the least trusted in Europe, according to research by the European Broadcasting Union.

It carried out surveys of 1,000 members of the public in each of 33 European countries for its Trust in Media report.

The UK has by far the least trusted “written press”of any European country, according to the survey. Its net trust score is minus 51, which is the percentage points difference between those who tend to trust the written press versus those who do not.”

Brian Doonthetoon @ 9.27
That’s what I was wondering, why he/she is so desperate not to be English?
To deny their ain country and depend on us staying in an old Treaty agreement to keep an artificial identity…bizarre!!

K1 My country is the UK, the only sovereign country in GB. I have not lost the debate at all, I am absolutely right. The only sovereign country in GB with its own Passport, currency, Head of State, representation at the G7, the G20, the UN and the Olympics is the UK. England and Scotland are ceremonial countries, nothing more

K1 Quebec was independent for decades after Scotland was, Quebec even has its own language. French is spoken by far more Quebecois than Gaelic is in Scotland. Catalonia and Quebec have their own.Parliamemts but send representatives to the national Parliament too exactly as Scotland does. Scotland is a region of the UK in all but name, it has not really been a country since 1707.

K1 England is effectively a region of the UK too, neither it nor Scotland are any different from say Bavaria, which was a country but is now a regional state of Germany, or Naples which was also a country but is now a region of Italy.

Brian Doonthethoon The UK is in reality the only sovereign country in GB. Thankyou for your comments on my civility which I hope to retain, I of course have English identity but it means no more to me than the fact I was born in Kent and live in Essex. My country is the UK. There is the English Democrats I believe who want an English Parliament but they have limited support

The term ‘UK’ literally means ‘United Kingdom’. It is a bipartite ‘union’ between Scotland and England, to ‘unify’ the two separate Kingdoms?

Neither Scotland nor England became ‘extinct’ as a result of the Union?

Church, Education, Justiciary and Law are competencies controlled by Scotland that were written into the Acts of Union in perpetuity. If Scotland is a ‘ceremonial’ ‘country’ how come we still govern these competencies?

They were not ‘devolved’ by Westminster. They were included as part of devolution as they had to be according to the Treaty of Union? We are literally a separate and disntint ‘nation’/’kingdom’/’country’ from England.

There is no one ‘GB constitution’, there is no country called the ‘UK’. The full title you have yourself stated is: The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

How can there be a country called ‘UK’ inserted into a separate entity called ‘Great Britain’?

It’s not the United Kingdom ‘in’ Great Britain and Northern Ireland?

Which is what you are claiming when you write: The UK is in reality the only sovereign country in GB.

Its beyond absurd what you are asserting here. It’s not real, it’s not factual. It’s literally someone making terms up that don’t make any sense and more saliently making statement that are patently provably false.

K1 The Act of Union brought two sovereign countries, England (and Wales) and Scotland into one sovereign country the Kingdom of Great Britain, much like the unification of Germany or Italy. From then on England and Scotland were effactively ceremonial countries only.

K1 @ 12.48
Oh my giddy aunt…. now we have the United Kingdom of Great Britain…
But on the bright side, if HYFUD really believes that …. then it would follow that there’s no more need for the Treaty of Union and it could be dissolved… now on that K1 I’m sure we would agree..

HYFUD @ 6.39
Yip that’s them.. the very same…
The Same Sovereign Scots who will vote again (and right soon)for the Treaty your “ United Kingdom of Great Britain “ doesn’t need and my Scotland now wants gone to be dissolved
An elegant solution all round.. don’t ye think….

The same ones who voted 62% to remain in the EU and are now being dragged out by your country?

There’s a conundrum needing solved…lot of so called ‘no’ voters voted exactly the same as so called ‘yes’ voters. When polled devolution in Scotland remains a staggering high 70’s %.

Many ‘no’ voters…were and are ‘soft noes’ as in ‘not right now, let’s give it another chance with UK’ and more saliently it absolutely was so close that purdah was thrown out the window with BBC live coverage of Gordon Brown pacing a tv studio promising ‘as close to home rule’ as was possible if we voted No. Alistair Darling went on ‘national’ (joke) BBC Scotland’s flagtime 6pm news programme and when asked if Scotland was being offered ‘Devomax’ answered ‘Yes’. He lied through his teeth.

Cameron, Clegg, Milliband…the 3 amigos, assisted by Gordon Brown, who had Cameron’s ear, schemed and produced along with the then Editor of the Daily Record the infamous ‘Vow’ (Murray Foote has now disavowed his own vow and will now be supporting independence, that’s right…he changed his mind in light of UKexit) on the front of page of the Daily Record literally promising virtually ‘home rule’, that our parliament would be made ‘permanent’ et al, if we voted No.

They (tories) claimed the Vow was a ‘political’ manouvre and the government would not commit to the lies on that front page, even with Cameron’s signature on it?

That’s how ‘close’ that vote was, it was only when they realised ‘oh shit’ Yes are in the lead that they rushed all this crap and blasted it out in that last week. The postal votes had already gone out and they broke every rule in the electoral book to get that 52% that your are ‘gloating’ about as if it set in some eternal stone?

It’s not. We have a situation in motion that is even bigger than what took place 4 years ago…and that I notice you don’t once refer to?

None of the Vow’s promises have held up, every single amendment crushed at Westminster, our parliament has not been given permanent status, the Sewel convention chucked out the window: 24 of our ‘devolved’ powers are to be repatriated to Westminster post UKexit, including agriculture and fisheries, food standards et al., and we don’t get a say in any of this? They’ve picked a random number of ‘7 Years’ before we would get these powers back to our parliament. What damage in 7 seven years do you imagine your precious supreme Tories will cause Scotland to suffer?

You do ‘context free’ ‘headline’s and numbers I can add together to make it look like ‘I’m ‘RIGHT’.

What you don’t do is understand how nuanced the whole issue of independence is in Scotland. We have no voters in our families, in our work places, we have yes voters in our families and workplaces and what we don’t do is go around denigrating each other because we have different views on the constitution question in our country. (you’re mistaking ‘unionists’ online and in the press, for ordinary citizens), the core ‘Tory’ vote in Scotland is really only about 20-24% tops. Most of the people who now vote for the SNP are ex Labour voters?

You started this whole spiel on here and made it about ‘nats’, using that word in a derogatory and smearing fashion. You literally capitalised the word National as if you were holding it up as some ‘proof positive’ that these were ‘nationalist scum’ you were talking to and about?

You never once apologised for the extremely rude and downright arrogant and ignorant comments you were called up on wrt these derogatory terms?

What you did do is ignore those points, same as you did with the Darrien scheme and fall back on ludicrous ‘terminology’ logic when called out about the contradictory statements you are making wrt ‘my country’ and ‘I’m a UKanian’ etc. You now once again fall back on ‘numbers added together are bigger’ than the actual majority party governing Scotland?

Again without acknowledging the explanation for how this makes no logical or realistic sense to even think in those terms when it comes to our voting system/s.

Majority’s are what win in elections. SNP have in all elections won the majority of seats throughout Scotland. I’ve literally painstakingly explained this and this is all you now have to end with: 2014 nah nah nah and ‘when I add those numbers up it makes it sounds like a majority is governing your country’.

Labour have been destroyed in Scotland…ie they can’t get into power at Holyrood, the Lbdems destroyed themselves, i.e. they can’t get into power at Holyrood, the Tories have never even ‘power shared’ at Holyrood, the chance of there ever being a Tory party governing Scotland from Holyrood is unbelievably ludicrous…even with all that dark money and targeted (areas) with their bigot filled hateful campaigns they merely only ‘stole’ Labour votes?

There is no such thing as unionists ruling Scotland because some Scots vote for other parties. ‘Other Party’s all combined’ is not a political party that can govern or run for office in Scotland?

Now see if you can take all of that in ‘again’ because I have pointed it all out already for you. This time digest it. And perhaps you can stop burping up the same bits of ‘soundbites I heard or read somewhere that said this was a good argument to make against those supporting the SNP in Scotland’.

Indeed in 2007 it was the fact Unionist parties won a majority of seats at Holyrood that prevented the SNP calling an independence referendum over the course of that Parliament even though the SNP won most seats.

HYFUD @ 11.49
Ah but the panic of the Westminster Establishment tells me much…and the Mandate dinnay forget the Mandate..
Follow the evidence not the media and you’ll see!!
The 1707 Treatys day’s are numbered!

HYFUD @ 11.58
What has that to do with the Treaty agreement were were discussing?
And I’m not falling for the obvious mistake by the way..
Its your country of a United Kingdom of Great Britain and my Scotland and the 1707 Treaty of Union thats the issue!

Why haven’t you provided the % vote share of the Holyrood elections by party for 2016 and for the 2017 (much more recent trend) election?

I mean these would give a truer (strength of numbers ‘is’ ‘your’ point) picture of what the country is voting for in who they elect at government and local council level throughout Scotland, wouldn’t they?

If you are saying that the % per party added together is some how a ‘measure’ of the ‘direction of travel’ politically speaking, in Scotland (this must apply elsewhere obvs, will you do the England breakdown too for us all?) and you are only relying on Westminster vote share to make this point…why haven’t you provided that information?

Do the unionist parties outnumber the SNP in this regard? How many MSP’s do the Tories have in Scotland? How many MSP’s do Labour have in Scotland, likewise Libdem? What about the Greens? Likewise councillors…what’s the breakdown across Scotland, by party?

You ‘do’ understand that we all decided to completely remove Labour from as many tiers of government as we could after 2014, don’t you?

With our D’Hondt (Holyrood) and Single Transferable Vote(Local elections) proportional representation systems making that very difficult to do, we did in fact make quite a dent…Tories picked up the majority of those losses from Labour in 2016’s Holyrood Election. (Likewise with our Local elections) Becoming for the first time the 3rd party in Scotland (*first time in 98 years Labour was ever 3rd place in Scotland), having been either in 1st or 2nd place by seat count since we reconvened our parliament.

I digress…do furnish us with those figures please.

Och…I’m not being fair…here, this should help…here’s the results from 2016 Holyrood elections:

Could you take a look at the column that signifies gains and losses wi the little red and green arrows on the ‘Results’ graphic? Can you see the relationship between Labour losses and Tory gains? Hey SNP’s fortunes rise and fall like all party’s…but ye gotta acknowledge that we understand the ‘nuance’ of what is taking place in our country…as the Labour ship sinks…where de ye think the ‘unionist’ vote is going?

Are the Tories making huge inroads into the SNP vote share?

I’ll give you the opening paragraph from that link:

‘The Scottish National Party won the election and a third term in government, but fell two seats short of securing a second consecutive overall majority. The Conservatives saw a significant increase in support and replaced the Labour Party as the second-largest party and main opposition in the Scottish Parliament. *This was the first time that Labour had finished in third place at a Scottish election in 98 years. The Scottish Greens won six seats on the regional list and overtook the Liberal Democrats, who remained on five seats.

Although the SNP had lost their majority, it was still by far the largest single party in the Scottish Parliament, with more than double the seats of the Conservatives. Accordingly, Sturgeon announced she would form a minority SNP government. She was voted in for a second term as First Minister on 17 May’.

Again can you look at the ‘Results’ graphics, and again can you see the pattern?

I’ll give you the opening paragraph from that link too:

‘The 2017 Scottish local elections were held on Thursday 4 May, in all 32 local authorities. The SNP retained its position as the largest party in terms of votes and councillors, despite suffering minor losses. The Conservatives made gains and displaced Labour as the second largest party, while the Liberal Democrats suffered a net loss of councillors despite increasing their share of the vote.’

——————————–

If you’re going to ‘cite’ percentages of a referendum result and 1 Westminster election as somehow ‘signifying’ Scotland is really a ‘unionist’ country do you not think it’s a bit ‘sly’ not to include the other elections results that take place within Scotland itself?

These provide a more nuanced and dare I say balanced view of what is actually happening in my country?

These facts contradict your assertion that those percentages you are falling back on are in any way incontrovertible proof that Scotland has ‘made’ it’s mind up ‘constitutionally’ speaking? There is no move away from the SNP in Scotland, locally, nationally or UK wide.

The collapse of Labour’s vote is a direct consequence of them getting into bed during indref1. We told them we’d had it, and we meant it.

Now we are down to the ‘remnants’ of ‘Unionism’ in Scotland. That is why those who claimed they were ‘Labour’ for decades, going for one cheek of the same arse, then slid over to the other side of the bed during our most recent National and Local elections.

You can continue to ‘make up’ whatever you want. You don’t live here and you have no idea what we’ve been doing nor any of the reasons why. We all have different reasons ‘why’ we support the proposition of Scotland running it’s own affairs and it’s not in your gift to come on here and tell us we’re wrong because we vote for a party with the term ‘National’ in it.

LizG The Westminster establishment got a 55% vote for the Union, which shows they know rather better how to win a referendum than the EU establishment who lost the EU referendum with only 48% for Remain.

It is YOUR sovereign country of the UK too as the 2014 referendum result affirmed

K1 Like the just 37% of voters who voted for the SNP at the 2017 general election, the most recent vote in Scotland?

As the links prove the SNP lost seats in both the 2016 Holyrood and 2017 local elections culminating in the disastrous 2017 general election for the nationalists when the SNP lost over a third of their MPs.

So when it came to the recent EU withdrawal bill and the whole parliament voted with the SNP government in rejecting that bill bar the Tories.

How does that translate into ‘unionism’ winning in Scotland?

You still won’t deal with the ‘material’ change in circumstances since indyref in 2014, will you? All the other ‘unionist’ parties voted with the Scottish government…what you are trying to suggest is that there is some ‘black and white’ division along constitutional lines, there isn’t.

This is about protecting our parliament, our resources and our polity, even Labour and Libdems voted with the SNP…our parliament works on consensus and we have had minority governments throughout since the parliament reconvened, so what? The consensus is…Scotland will not be shafted by UKexit.

Vote split on that EU Withdrawal rejection: 93 votes to 30.

What does that do to your ‘theory’ of ‘unionism’ is the new black in Scotland?

(Oh…the Greens are an independence supporting party, i.e. not ‘unionist…guess who can make decisions for the most part regarding indyref2 with the backing of the Greens…without any unionist parties votes?)

Scotland voted to stay in the UK in 2014, the UK voted to Leave the EU in 2016. End of conversation.

The SNP pushed the ‘material change of circumstances’ line as a result of the Brexit vote for another referendum in 2017 before the general election and were trounced, losing over a third of their MPs and winning just 37% of the vote.

The clear verdict of the 2017 general election in Scotland was a clear No to any indyref2 after the Brexit vote and Westminster will rightfully use that mandate to block any indyref2 before the next Holyrood election in 2021

So you won’t look at the ‘vote share’…as Labour falls Tories rise. Even in the paragraph I quoted it stated on the 2016 Holyrood election:

‘Although the SNP had lost their majority, it was still by far the largest single party in the Scottish Parliament, with more than double the seats of the Conservatives.

And on the Local election paragraph from above:

‘The SNP retained its position as the largest party in terms of votes and councillors, despite suffering minor losses.

To also claim that 2017 GE was ‘disastrous’ is stretching the limits of hyperbole on this matter. 2015 was ‘Historic’ in terms of SNP gains? It was absolutely inevitable given the campaign that was run by the Tories in Scotland, one of the dirtiest in our history that of course we would lose seats…the bar was far too high to repeat. Not even in Westminster elections do the party’s ever get those number in the modern era?

The trend is the important aspect in the context of Scotland and how we vote.

Your repeating of the same tropes and percentages don’t take any of this reality into account. And as I’m beginning to suspect this is an ‘ideological’ issue for you which you are not being transparent about I rather think you will just continue to repeat over and over again what you have done?

“The United Kingdom is a sovereign state. Its four constituent countries, whilst having equal rights to elect Members of Parliament on (nominally) the same terms, are sometimes considered to be of different status. This view may be supported by the existence of devolved governments with different levels of power in Scotland and Wales (see Asymmetrical federalism). Due to historical precedent, England, Scotland, and Wales are countries and nations in their own right (although none of these is sovereign today). Wales is also a principality of the United Kingdom ( Prince of Wales is a title usually given to the heir apparent to the British throne). Northern Ireland is sometimes described by United Kingdom citizens as a province of the United Kingdom, which derives from the Irish province of Ulster, which Northern Ireland is part of.”

“The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (UK) consists of a group of islands off the western coast of Europe. The largest, Great Britain, comprises three countries: England, Scotland and Wales. Ireland, to the west, consists of the UK’s province of Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic. There are several offshore islands and island groups, the largest lying off Scotland.

The UK is a union of four countries: England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The Crown dependencies (the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man) are largely self-governing with the UK responsible for their defence and international relations and are not part of the United Kingdom.”

HYFUD @ 12.28
Being good at winning referendums is no exactly the point..
It tells us nothing about how a vote would register should both participants be evenly matched.
Making the Treaty agreement work was yer Government’s only hope of Scotland staying in this Union of two Kingdom’s.
And they are not good at that.
They infact have deceived people into the fantasy that my country disappeared somehow.
Now, I neither know or care why you think that the Treaty arrangements are working for you and your Country but it’s no working for me and mine.
And up with that we will not put!
We are going to demonstrate this to enough Scots and dissolve the Treaty.

The 2017 GE was not a referendum on Scotland’s constitutional situation, it was a General Election. The SNP were not ‘trounced’, I’ve already provided the links that support the fact of my statement and refute the assertion of yours. They are the Scottish government several seats short of a majority, an astounding position to be in after 11 years in power at Holyrood.

‘The SNP pushed the ‘material change of circumstances’ line as a result of the Brexit vote for another referendum in 2017’

The ‘material change of circumstances’ statement was part of the 2016 manifesto pledge before the Holyrood elections: prior to the EU vote in June 2016 and I quote:

‘We believe that the Scottish Parliament should have the right to hold another referendum if there is clear and sustained evidence that independence has become the preferred option of a majority of the Scottish people – or if there is a significant and material change in the circumstances that prevailed in 2014, such as Scotland being taken out of the EU against our will.’

Your are confused about the order of play on this issue, so how does it alter your assertion knowing that you are in fact wrong about this?

You refuse to see the trend in Scotland and insist your are ‘right’. Irrespective of the ‘actual’ reality that the SNP in fact are the majority party in Scotland. Across all governmental tiers.

You do know we will be having ‘other’ elections and that ‘things can and will’ change?

And you are aware that Westminster ‘can’t block’ another indyref?

Look it up if you are not sure.

There’s an ‘intransigence’ in all your responses on here. An unwillingness to face facts and a determination to tell a polity distinct from your own that they are wrong for voting for a party that you don’t like and that they are wrong to support the right of Scotland to self determination.

You are incorrect in all your assertions and are now just making stuff up to suit ‘your own bias’

Btw, just to reiterate on the ‘blocking of indyref’, that’s why Theresa May couldn’t outright ‘block’ the possibility of a referendum and could only say ‘not right now’,(prior to the GE17 ‘snap’ election’)that’s why no politician in his/her right mind would ever commit outright to saying ‘yes we will block it’ when asked repeatedly at the time, ‘would you block Scotland having another referendum’, because it is not in their gift to decide whether we can have one or not.

The Section 30 order was just a contract stating that the result would be respected from both sides. It wasn’t a ‘permission slip’.

Do ‘read’ more deeply beyond the msm it will help you understand what’s happening in Scotland.

Oh…just to finish and clarify we already have our second indyref motion passed by the parliament on March 27th 2017. By 69 to 59 votes.

This was just before the ‘snap’ GE17 election, which none of us was aware was going to happen, it was ‘announced’ on the 18th April 2017, the GE took place on the 8th June 2017.

The ‘snap’ election came on the back of us already having passed the motion to have indyref vote in late 2018 or early 2019 when the ‘terms’ where known for UKexit?

The Tories in Scotland then went into overdrive (turns out targeted sectarian, bigots et al, tactical voting from both Labour and Tory activists working together in those areas they were focused on winning) on a ‘no referendum’ ticket during that general election campaign, msm happily gave them lots of air cover. Not what the SNP get btw, it’s even more remarkable here because we’re wining in spite of full on SNP bad from the opposition parties and the BBC and every single newspaper in Scotland bar one, against us?

Can you imagine where we would be if we had the msm behind us?

Nicola Stugeon made it clear that the GE was not being run on an ‘independence’ ticket, it was mostly run on anti austerity and strengthening our social security system and a raft of other progressive policies.

For you to rely so heavily on those ‘headline’ figures as a meaningful ‘sign’ of diminished support for the SNP and an endorsement of ‘unionism’ in Scotland is such a shallow and context free trope, that it can’t seriously be considered as matching the reality of our situation here in Scotland.

No matter how many times you state those percentages, it doesn’t alter our reality.

We are a country. We are the signatory partner on the Treaty of Union that forms the United Kingdom. Our voice will be heard. The SNP are the vehicle and we will support them for as long as it takes for us to achieve our aims.

K1 Barely more than a third of Scots voted for the SNP in 2017 and yes I make no apology for being a Unionist. The SNP lost seats in the 2016 Scottish Parliament elections and then when it tried to use Brexit as an excuse for a new independence referendum lost over a third of its seats as a result

No official independence referendum can of course get through without Westminster approval. The SNP pushed an attempt to get an indyref2 through Holyrood in March 2017, the Scots resoundingly rejected that attempt in June 2017

HYFUD @ 9.29..
No body is askin ye to apologise for being a Unionist !
I can see clearly that your Country benefits enormously from staying in the Treaty agreement.
But mine doesn’t and that’s what we plan to demonstrate to our fellow Scots…The Treaty doesn’t work for us on many levels and must be struck down for Scotland to thrive.
If your government could show it did work for us,it would have been obvious by now… They have had 300 odd year’s..
But you’re perfectly welcome to try ….
Although we must get over your assertion that Scotland is not a Country in a Treaty agreement first….
We can’t seriously discuss a Treaty agreement until we define exactly the kind of Treaty we are disscussing!
You can post that Scotland isn’t a Country till the Rapture HYFUD, but you don’t get to do it unanswered…those days are gone

Actually even without Scotland, rUK would still have one of the biggest global cities in the world in London and still be in the G8 and G20. Scotland would lose access to all that.

However together we make a bigger impact on the world stage, I recognise Scottish whisky and financial services in Edinburgh make a great contribution to the UK economy and Edinburgh is a great classical city in its own right and the Scottish countryside is spectacular. The fact is Scotland now has its own Parliament which determines most Scottish domestic policy while still sending representatives to the Parliament at Westminster

HYFUD @ 4.57
Well I’m quite happy that England/rUK will do well.
But Scotland does not do as well as it could under the terms of the Treaty..
This has probably always been the case although until recently it has been almost impossible to demonstrate to enough Scots….and for a myriad or reasons impossible to do anything about!
As might means right often trumped democracy..

But now since it is clear that the Treaty is no the best way forward for Scotland ‘‘tis our obligation to end it…
Now I’m pretty sure that “together “ we will always make an impact on the world stage but as Two Independent nations with much in common but also with the freedom to organise our own society.
You mentioned London… well… that’s an asset you should look after…. of course you should.
But that’s no in the interest of Scotland to do so…
We have (as you said your self) different interests… you should not have to look out for Scotland’s Whisky interests either ….
And the beauty of the whole thing for us all….The whole point really is…
We get to bring our Government with in slapping distance,,, and I sincerely hope you get something of the same effect in England…

If Westminster is no longer minding everyone else’s business… mibbi you’ll get better Government too…
Because of one thing I’m sure all Governments need to be with in slapping distance…

HYFUD @ 10.41
We don’t have much choice…. as only time will tell..
And I don’t mean that one of us will be right about the Union ending..
But rather that it will prove to be the right thing to happen..
I’m quite confident it is… and I am perfectly prepared to accept you don’t think so.
But rest assured HYFUD I do genuinely think it’s for the best… and that we are so ,,not better together… I believe that good fences make good neighbors…
But I do wish ye my best and thank ye for your very respectful conversation..
IMHO we can converse at anytime… I hope you enjoyed working through our differences..

I bet we would have sorted Brexit PDQ …

Comment - please read this page for comment rules. HTML tags like <i> and <b> are permitted. Use paragraph breaks in long comments. DO NOT SIGN YOUR COMMENTS, either with a name or a slogan. Ignore these rules and I WILL KILL YOU WITH HAMMERS.